Welcome to Signals in the Noise: Election Edition #3, your weekly report on insights from across the narrative landscape. This week’s newsletter dives into stories, messages, content and conversations from across the narrative landscape between Monday, October 21st and Friday, October 25th.
This is in no way meant to provide a complete view of the narrative landscape, but it is meant to elevate insights and opportunities.
Here's the TL;DR...
Shift the focus from divisive stories about candidates to empowering stories highlighting the importance of voting rights and democratic participation. Emphasize grassroots engagement through GOTV efforts and early and mail-in voting. Don’t get distracted by tête-à-têtes about third-party or protest voting as the antagonistic mood could disincentivize voters. Focus on getting people to the polls and providing information to support their decisions on policies and ballot measures that resonate with them.
Use stories about the cost of living crisis to promote narratives of care, safety and security, and quality of life. Conversations, stories and messages about the minimum wage and corporate greed exploded during Trump’s McDonald’s PR stunt, showing how silly, fleeting moments can be used to promote progressive narratives about cost of living and quality of life. Keep an eye out for future opportunities and leverage those moments to funnel your messages and stories across platforms and audiences.
Get ready, stay ready. The 2020 election cycle taught us lessons in pre-and-debunking. Prep content against mis- and disinformation that targets Spanish-speaking communities including Cubans, Colombians and Venezuelans. Track for any new mis-and disinfo based on conversations with your base and what organizers overhear on the doors or in their phone banking.
Movement can still push Harris to enact an arms embargo.Polling data and some stories suggest the potential for a Trump win in battleground states. Allied organizations part of the Palestine solidarity movement can leverage these anxieties and push the Democrats to commit to a ceasefire and arms embargo using phone banking, mass email and faxing Democratic surrogates, disruptions at rallies and campaign events, and op-eds in legacy news media outlets.
Eat your Wheaties. We can and should expect some level of contestation on election results and certification on and after Election Day. Stay on top of fact checking in real time, set up a rapid response space to mull over possible election scenarios and how your organization will respond to threats.
Continue on to check out our full insights.
A Glimpse into the Narrative Landscape on Voting
The dominant narratives about voters and voting include:
- Harris is a threat to democracy
- Trump is a threat to democracy
- We need ranked-choice voting to save democracy
- We need a national popular vote to save democracy
- We need to vote for Harris to save democracy
- We need to vote for Trump to save America
- Voting is a right
- Voting is a privilege
Powered by Zignal Labs
We are looking back in order to look forward; by examining discussions about elections in the United States, we can understand how people are thinking about voting this year. Overall, electoral conversations from October 1st to October 25th are down 15% (-3.6 million mentions) in comparison to that same date range during the 2022 midterm elections. Concerns about COVID-19, abortion, crime (including related disinformation), student loan relief, social security, Medicaid and inflation were core parts of the landscape during the 2022 midterms. Senate races in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Wisconsin, Nevada and Ohio were characters in a story about electoral power and governance. In 2024, Senate races are not as loud on the national stage though abortion, immigration and stories about the economy are central to the narrative landscape across ideology.
This year, election conversations spiked on October 16th at 901k mentions and October 24th at 988k mentions. Popular stories in centrist, liberal and moderate legacy media focus on Trump, his brand of fascism and his mental state. Content in this spike also included accessible explanations of Project 2025. On the right, we’re seeing stories about Trump’s chances of winning and Harris’ performance at the CNN town hall blend with conversations about Christians sitting out the election, which is only exacerbated by Vance’s recent claims that Harris is “prejudiced against Catholics.” These claims target religious communities and will likely continue in order to boost GOTV efforts in favor of Trump and narratives about protecting religious freedoms.
Trump’s momentum is “too big to rig.” The emergent phrase comes from the Trump camp and its supporters who are praising early voting and encouraging GOTV campaigns to turn out the vote so that the Dems can’t “rig” this election. This is a stark difference from their narratives in 2016 and 2020 where they tried to impede early and mail-in voting, by claiming this access to voting would increase the chances of fraud. Elon Musk is a main character in stories about Trump, GOTV and voter fraud as speculation grows from legacy news media and the Justice Department that his cash-for-votes scheme is likely illegal. Quiet stories include the RNC’s Protect the Vote tour recruiting poll watchers, and Musk’s “election integrity community” which posts disinformation from 2020 to drum up support for a potential coup. Disinformation about “noncitizen voting” and claims of voter fraud can be found here, too.
Other GOTV content includes:
- stories about ballot measures in Alaska to increase minimum wage and repeal ranked choice voting
- abortion propositions in Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New York and South Dakota
- weed legalization in Florida
- ballot measures in California and Nevada to #EndtheException of slavery.
Yes, you read that right - it’s 2024, and slavery is on the ballot in some states.
Popular content during the spikes in October came from YouTube, X, Substack blogs, and legacy news media like The Daily Beast, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Democracy Now!, and Mother Jones. Influencers and loudspeakers include Mike Cernovich, Charlie Spiering, Robert Reich, Bill Madden, Jack Hopkins and Cori Bush to name a few. This week was big on celebrity endorsements with Sarah Jessica Parker, Stevie Nicks, Lizzo, Kamie Crawford, Eminem, Bruce Springsteen, Tyler Perry, Spike Lee, and finally, Beyoncé coming out swinging for the Harris campaign.
Service Workers Deserve Better and So Do We
Narratives in conversations about the economy include:
- We need an economy that works for all Americans
- We need a government that prioritizes people, not profits
- Corporations are the engine of the economy
- Corporations are entitled to the wealth they produce
- The government is responsible for meeting our needs
- Capitalism and democracy go hand in hand
- Everyone should be able to afford basic necessities
- Everyone is responsible for meeting their own needs
- Capitalism is dying
- Safety and security
Did you have Trump serving fries at McDonald’s on your 2024 bingo card? His campaign’s attempt to appeal to working class people with a brief stint at the fast food chain placed his economic policies at the forefront. Depending on your algorithm you might have seen different stories. Maybe you saw videos of him shaking hands at the drive-thru, or criticisms of the stunt as cosplay. You might have even seen claims that the McDonald’s e.coli outbreak was a conspiracy to hurt Trump’s election chances. Evidently, this stunt afforded people an opportunity to talk not only about food safety and recalls but the minimum wage and corporate greed. Taking advantage of a PR blitz can be an opportunity to shift the conversation toward progressive stories, messages and narratives for a multitude of audiences.
The corporate price gouging framework comes primarily from political pundits, economists, elected officials and legacy media outlets, spiking in conversation in August 2024 after Harris announced her anti-price gouging plan. At 397k mentions for the last year (October 1, 2023 to October 25, 2024), it is lower in volume than related conversations about the economy like inflation (52 million mentions), cost of living (9.1 million mentions) gas prices (3.8 million mentions), or the housing crisis (2.6 million mentions). These differences in volume indicate there is more interest and attention to issues affecting the day-to-day, indicating an opportunity to address questions and concerns folks have about the cost of living, the price of gas or housing.
As we elevated in The Latest, stories about corporate greed have become part of stories about the election. The right wing media ecosystem is already playing up narratives that are pro-capitalism. They are using nostalgia and upcoming holiday excitement to frame corporations slashing prices to win back cash-strapped customers as a success. These stories combine “Trump-era inflation-free prices” with narratives that cast both Trump and corporations as economic champions. There is an opportunity to channel the holiday spirit into concerted indictments of greedy corporations and billionaire CEOs that addresses people’s inflation woes.
While redbaiting claims are low in volume, we can expect to see a growing number of stories that claim that Harris’ economic policies are communist. Redbaiting is successful in peeling off voters, especially from Venezuelan and Cuban communities, a tactic deployed in states like Florida during the 2020 elections. In anticipation of this predictable trend, there are opportunities to combat castrochavismo and redbaiting in Latine communities across states like Georgia, Florida and Texas by uplifting progressive policies and propositions that will improve material conditions for the better. Use narratives that praise freedom and democracy and smash corruption. Create pre-and debunking content that is accessible in both language and cultural contexts to disseminate across social media platforms, IRL at the salon or church, and on WhatsApp.
Harris Courts the Middle, Leaving Out Arab Constituents in Battleground States
Dominant narratives in this conversation include:
- The Democrats are out of touch with voters
- America needs a strong leader
- Harris is too weak to be president
- Trump is too unhinged to be president
- Votes are earned, not guaranteed
- You can’t trust the government
- If the Democrats lose, blame the 3rd party vote
- If the Democrats lose, blame the Democrats
- America must enact an arms embargo against Israel now
- The US is fighting for power on the global stage
- Safety and security
- Everyone has a right to self-determination
While Harris uses abortion and branding herself as a charismatic, relatable leader to appeal to voters in Arizona and Georgia, she is deploying different tactics in states like Pennsylvania to court disaffected Republicans, independents and the white moderate. Polling data shows the election is a toss up and while polls provide one slice of the story, it’s not worth ignoring completely with two weeks remaining in the election season. In Harris’s attempts at building a bigger tent for Democrats and Republicans, her campaign is leaving Arab and Arab American communities in battleground states behind. However, stories about this constituency operate at a lower volume overall when compared to stories about Harris and her polling data or about battleground states. Let’s zoom in.
Journalists, political analysts and pundits, legacy media and organizations like the Justice Democrats and the IMEU Policy Project are sounding the alarm about Harris’s concerning approach courting the right as a way to outsmart them, calling this a losing strategy akin to John Kerry’s loss in 2004. Others are speculating the blue wall state of Michigan is now a toss up or likely a swing towards Trump because of her policies on Gaza. Influencers on social media, with a concentration on TikTok, have used the concept of the “single issue voter” to elevate the belief that the Harris campaign does not care about Arabs and Arab American constituents. These influencers go on to cite her lack of commitment to an arms embargo, snubbing the Uncommitted movement at the DNC, and removing former Congressional candidate Ahmed Ghanim from a campaign event in Michigan. A small share of the conversation is placing blame on Biden for refusing to take action to stop Israel, denying Harris a chance at winning the election.
The Abandon Biden campaign is pushing unity around third party voting to snub the Democrats and stand for truth and justice in battleground states like Georgia, Michigan and Wisconsin. An outright rejection of the two-party system is being leveraged by socialist candidates as they promote solutions against the duopoly and demands for housing, healthcare, education and a living wage towards their base and persuadable audiences. The mood and tone in the discourse about voting third party and protest voting is urgent, patronizing, sarcastic and argumentative across platforms. The influencers and loudspeakers in this conversation are multiracial, cross-class and spread across liberal, progressive and leftist ideologies.
Content and messaging from centrists and liberals repeat the claim that a vote for Jill Stein, or any other candidate on a third party ticket, is a vote for Trump and that a Trump win poses a risk of dismantling democracy. Self-ascribed Harris voters are calling third party voters privileged and already placing blame on them in case Harris loses, while 3rd party voters describe their choice as an electoral tactic worth the effort in building an alternative system. Third party voters and voters who don’t plan on voting for either candidate place blame on Harris for not listening to calls for an arms embargo for her campaigns’ decreased momentum. In conversations about the “lesser of two evils,” you’ll find people explaining why they are voting for Harris, some sitting in grief, while others weigh the contradictions of their political beliefs. You will also find content and conversations about the Democrats’ failed promises in codifying Roe, genocide as their red line, and a rejection of neoliberal identity politics.
In the blame game about which group is responsible if Harris wins or loses the election, conversations about voting employ a competition framework on identity, which is then used across party affiliation and ideology to undermine multiracial solidarity. We have dealt with this trend for many election cycles now and it shows no signs of letting up.
Looking at Predictions to Predict Some More!
In Vertigo Variations, our 2024 narrative predictions report, we followed a prediction about the rise of the multipolar world. At the time, BRICS was only a few countries, led by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. This year, we have watched all of the ways traditional U.S. alliances have shuffled. Amidst the genocide in Gaza, many more countries have a heightened interest in BRICS and a new global framework defined by autonomy and economic fragmentation. Next week, we will look at how narratives about foreign policy impact this year’s election cycle, and the ways militarism, policing and internationalism are likely to pose opportunities for movement to make power plays in demanding an arms embargo and ending Israel’s genocidal onslaught on Palestine and Lebanon.
Look for our following Signals in the Noise: Election Edition newsletter for more insights and analysis!
Why do Americans avoid the news? An interview between Benjamin Toff and Eduardo Suarez of Neiman Lab gives a laundry list of reasons, some of which may surprise you.
New York City got its first ‘W’ in what seems like a very long time (thanks, Eric Adams) this past weekend with the Liberty’s WNBA champion win against the Minnesota Lynx. Can we please give the keys to Ellie the Elephant?
No one leads single-issue lives. All of our issues are interconnected and that includes the fight for Palestinian liberation. Check out the Transgender Law Center’s infographic on how trans justice means a free Palestine.
.jpeg)
.png)
%20(1).png)
