Elizabeth Goodspeed on the new battleground of political swag

With election day just a month away, Americans have found themselves caught in the crossfire of increasingly bizarre and depressing campaign antics – Donald Trump awkwardly swaying to Ave Maria, Kamala Harris casually dropping references to her glock, and JD Vance seemingly learning to interact with human beings for the very first time. The Republican party has gone full mask-off, while the Democrats are struggling to recapture the fleeting enthusiasm for Harris seen before and just after her nomination (mostly thanks to her gaffes about coconut trees). But at this point, the real battleground, at least online, doesn’t seem to be about debates or policy platforms. The best way to win an election? Start with a viral merch drop. Campaigns might not be able to buy votes, but they’ve certainly mastered the art of selling them.

For as long as Americans have embraced our love of consumerism, making stuff has been a tangible way for candidates to connect with voters. In 1836, blue-blooded William Henry Harrison distributed log cabin-shaped bottles (a jab at critics who claimed he’d retreated to drink hard cider) to craft a down-to-earth image during his presidential campaign, while in 1860, Abraham Lincoln used railsplitter-themed pins to align himself with everyday Americans during a time of deep national division. Campaign materials serve as both weapons and shields; promoting candidates while also taking aim at their opponents. John Quincy Adams’ 1828 campaign circulated ‘coffin handbills’ attacking Andrew Jackson as a reckless military leader, while also creating sewing boxes for women to express their political leanings, despite not yet having the right to vote. By the 20th century, items like Thomas E. Dewey’s 1948 “Dew-it-with-Dewey” shirt marked a shift towards more relatable and personal campaign merch, with a focus away from functional items like pipes or snuff boxes. As voter demographics expanded, merch became more diverse too, like paper dresses and domestic items designed to engage women voters post-Suffrage, or campaign materials like Ronald Reagan’s “Viva Reagan” buttons that targeted Spanish-speaking immigrant voters. In all cases, the stuff candidates made, and the way these things looked, directly tapped into the social and political currents of their given era and shaped how the campaign was perceived by the public.

Politicians haven’t stopped using this tactic since. As my British colleagues were amused (or perhaps disturbed) to discover when I pitched this column, every US campaign – from local state reps to the president – is a full-blown branding exercise. Unlike in the UK, where candidates generally follow codified party aesthetics, campaigns within the two major US parties lack a cohesive visual identity at the corporate level. A glance at the homepage of The Center for American Politics and Design (CAPD), which tracks the graphic vernacular of American politics, shows just how splintered the landscape has become. Even assumptions like Democrats leaning on blue (the US norm, despite red representing left-leaning parties in most of the world) and sans serifs, or Republicans sticking to the red and serifs, don’t hold up. In fact, CAPD’s data reveals serif usage is nearly equal, with 68 percent of Democrats and 62 percent of Republicans using them. As to colour, even Trump’s yard signs predominantly feature a deep blue background. Though some Republicans mimic Trump’s boxed-in logo with stars, others incorporate blue waves, spruce trees, or a silhouette of an AR-15 (thematically apt for the gun-loving party, but still surprisingly unique!) Likewise, plenty of Democrats have logos that you might mistake for a MAGA sign at first.

Just like any business entity, candidates now create multi-channel media campaigns tailored to their voter base. In 2024, campaign merch has become one of the most effective tools for forging quick, viral connections with voters. Once limited to official channels, political merch now functions as a lasting form of personal expression; voters wear it to signal something about themselves, not just the candidate. According to WWD, 72 percent of voters plan to keep their merch long after the election, with 66 percent expecting to hold onto it for at least 5-10 years. And while official campaign merch still helps determine the zeitgeist, much of a campaign’s cultural impact and visual world is now shaped by independent creatives producing their own political ephemera. The design language and conceptual range of this “grassroots” paraphernalia is vast, reflecting how voters engage with campaigns in personal, irreverent, and often contradictory ways; you'll find just as many “Christians for Harris” signs as “Christians against Harris” on sites like Etsy, or “Voting for the Felon” as both pro- and anti-Trump rallying cries. Elections – and their merch – are increasingly about capturing the mood, aesthetics, and humour of the moment. But can an election really be won on t-shirts and vibes alone?

One notable entry in the merch wars is the Harris-Walz camo hat – described on the official Kamala Harris store as “the most iconic political hat in America,” and recently seen gracing the heads of Bon Iver and Ella Emhoff (the only person to authentically exist at the intersection of Dimes Square and Capitol Hill). Is the hat a nod to heartland farmers who wear camo to hunt, ‘Carhartt-core’ coastal elites who wear it to the club, Trump’s own camo hats from recent years, or a play on Chappell Roan’s ‘Midwest Princess’ camo hat (itself a riff on that same heartland farmer)? Does it matter? Harris’ campaign is, after all, simultaneously trying to win back the same working-class voters who authentically don camo while also appealing to the zeitgeist of Gen Z and millennial voters who’ve ironically adopted the very same stylistic universe – or as one Twitter user sagely put it: “how gay do you have to be to see hunting colours and think it’s a Chappell Roan thing.” The ambiguity is the point.

Merch is no longer about simply backing a candidate; it’s a medium for expressing a networked collection of different beliefs and values. Stick the Vote, co-founded by Brooklyn-based design studio L&L and author Matthew Burgess, demonstrates this shift. Launched in 2018, Stick the Vote invites artists to riff on the classic American “I Voted” sticker in important election years. L&L cofounder Leigh Mignogna agrees that merch can be more about connecting within the aisle than across it, saying: “we wanted to do something so we didn’t feel like we were just throwing our hands in the air – stickers aren’t going to change the world, but they’re a way to build community.” In 2024, most sticker submissions they received emphasise voting in favour of broader values like the environment and trans rights, or simply espouse the benefits of voting itself; I only found three stickers explicitly naming Harris Walz in the bunch. As other L&L co-founder Liz Turow puts it: “It’s engaging people based on the issues they care about, not just the candidate.” These designs reflect a kind of strategic abstraction, especially prevalent amongst liberal voters, where support is driven more by a set of particular political concerns than by fervent, personal loyalty to a candidate. Merch acts as shorthand for the larger political anxieties voters are feeling – like climate change, reproductive agency, and social justice. The absence of more candidate-focused messaging underscores how much this election, for some, is about voting against Trump and Vance’s Nationalist bigotry rather than for a specific person or party (see: the myriad Childness Cat Ladies for Harris shirts).

This stands in stark contrast to the more candidate-centred merch that dominated earlier 21st Century presidential elections, like Obama’s “Hope” posters and the “I’m With Her” campaign designed by Michael Beirut for Hillary Clinton – along with the myriad of #Girlboss pantsuit-focused merch – which framed Clinton as a corporate feminist figure. As Lindsay Ballant noted in 2016 in Bernie, Hillary, and the Authenticity Gap: A Case Study in Campaign Branding, Clinton’s campaign, despite being technically flawless, often felt too controlled to foster genuine participation – Clinton couldn’t be with you if you were already with her. By contrast, Bernie Sanders’ more slap-dash merch had an unpolished, DIY energy that resonated with voters craving authenticity. Writ large, the professionalisation of political branding, especially on the left, has led to an overly polished aesthetic that can feel more up-market than grassroots; the campaign visuals and merch made by high-profile designers like Order, Hyperakt, or Shepard Fairey mimic corporate brand identities more than the raw, spontaneous energy that once fueled political movements. As in fashion, where polished branded merch has sparked bootleg alternatives, DIY Kamala merch offers voters something that feels more personal and expressive, rather than just slick campaign propaganda. Where candidates can’t (or won’t) push boundaries, independent creators step in, filling the gap with more meaningful designs that reflect real voter engagement.

The online store Merch for America (Kamala Merch for the duration of this campaign cycle) is one entity tapping into this homespun political charm, with a range of playful, pop-culture-inspired designs intended to resonate with voters looking for a less conventional way to engage with the campaign. Founders Nicole Najafi, a writer, and Kiana Toosi, a designer and founder of hospitality focused studio Holiday, note that for many left-leaning voters, wearing sanctioned merch can feel a bit too much like a form of idolatry. “Politicians are not heroes – bootleg merch simmers that down. We’re supporting, but we’re not crazy fans.” In other words, please stop putting politicians on fucking “patron saint” votive candles. Kamala Merch’s offerings include shirts with the Nasa meatball logo emblazoned with Kamala’s name, a reworked version of Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville branding (coconuts abound) and, my favourite as a New Englander, a Dunkin Donuts-inspired “Kamala Walz” design. Nicole and Kiana note that though some of their customers seem to be die-hard Kamala supporters – voters who consistently engage with the campaign and see these designs as an extension of their political activism – most of the people who buy shirts are more casual supporters who may not feel entirely aligned with Kamala’s policies, but enjoy the cultural and humorous aspect of the merch. Nicole says that “honestly, most people buying our merch probably aren’t walking around with ‘Kamala for President’ bumper stickers. They just think the designs are fun – something they can wear to signal where they stand without being too serious about it.”

Despite corporate logos for the Democrats and Republicans visually converging, there’s no denying that the homegrown look and feel of the Trump campaign remains unmistakably distinct. Where most political merch aims to bolster a candidate’s likeability or platform, Trump’s takes a more combative approach, leaning heavily into hyper-nationalistic iconography and aggressive slogans that reflect how his base perceives him – under siege by elites yet unbroken. Trumpian aesthetics embrace provocation for its own sake. Items like “Fuck Your Feelings” signs or posters of Trump giving the middle finger (amusingly rendered in the Obama-Hope style, which remains surprisingly popular across political divides) aren’t meant to convince – they exist purely to, as they say, trigger the left to “cry harder”. If DIY Kamala merch is designed to widen the circle, DIY Trump merch draws a line around it. Trump paraphernalia fixates on provocative images that blur the line between irony, mockery, and support. His mugshot, for instance, is used by detractors to highlight his criminality, and by supporters as a symbol of defiance. Similarly, the image of Trump with a bloodied ear taps into his combative persona, where even depictions of violence against him are reframed as signs of his own strength. These controversial visuals become rallying points for his base, reinforcing his image as both martyr and rebel. Any attempt to subvert these images only strengthens his mythos, fueling the spectacle that defines Trump’s political brand.

This isn’t necessarily a failure of creativity (though one could certainly argue that the conservative party struggles with a deficit of talented graphic designers) but rather a reflection of the way Trump’s base communicates through blunt symbols of power. For example, the American flag, perhaps the most potent symbol of Trump’s brand, is often displayed large-scale and in its most direct, unaltered form on his political swag, representing traditionalism and unwavering patriotism. For many on the right, the flag has become shorthand for loyalty to the country and, by extension, to Trump himself (evidenced by the number of unnecessarily large trucks you see on the highway flying an American flag alongside a MAGA one). Some flag variations do exist on the right, such as the Blue Lives Matter flag, which alters the flag’s colours to signify support for law enforcement – but even these alterations still align with broader external groups, like police or the military, reinforcing a sense of duty and loyalty to institutions rather than signalling individual identity. By contrast, left-leaning groups more frequently reclaim and reframe the flag to represent broader, inclusive, and more personal ideals – integrating elements like the rainbow flag or Pan-African colours to reflect marginalised voices within the national fabric. Recently, however, there has been a growing trend among liberal causes to reclaim the unaltered flag itself as a symbol of their own values, placing it in new contexts to challenge its right-wing associations. Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter aesthetic is one example, using the flag exactly as is but subverting its meaning by juxtaposing it with symbols of Black culture and progressive identity.

The poor design choices made by the conservative party, especially in the Trump era, underscore a long-standing issue on the right: a struggle with taste and creative relevance. The right’s cultural blind spot has long been a source of frustration for right-wingers who yearn for stylish, artistically relevant expressions of their political identity. If you can look past the provocations of calling Taylor Swift an “abortion-loving ditz,” right-wing publication The American Mind recently published a genuinely good essay addressing their party’s abysmal taste in culture and calling for the rejection of political kitsch and some of the worst music ever made. Only time will tell if they can evolve beyond racist memes and finally produce some capital-A art.

Lest we pat ourselves for doing the bare minimum, we can’t ignore that liberal aesthetics, while more polished, are just as prone to becoming formulaic. The left’s slick branding may present a more sophisticated front, but it often risks becoming a vehicle for surface-level alignment rather than a deeper connection to issues or policies. Even homemade liberal merch can feel increasingly conservative in its presentation, prioritising palatability over authenticity. As Samuel Hine wrote in GQ this May, “merch once made us feel unique, then it made us realise we weren’t unique after all.” This shift contrasts sharply with the raw, unapologetic messaging of earlier political expressions, like Zoe Leonard’s 1992 piece “I want a president,” which embodied a more radical, unfiltered voice. In 2024, even subversive or playful designs often blend into a sanitised, pre-packaged identity kit, where individuality gives way to polished signals of alignment with a broader movement, leaving less room for genuine, unpredictable expression.

Engaging with pop culture and making a Chappel Roan-inspired camo hat might grab attention and make headlines, but there’s a growing frustration with political figures who co-opt youth humour without making substantive policy shifts. The real question is how long the meme-driven strategy can work before it’s dismissed as another facade, a stand-in for the substantive change that voters – especially young, left-leaning voters – are demanding.