I don’t read the NYT, but I was listening to the Josh Marshall podcast at the gym this morning, and Kate Riga mentioned that David Plouffe wrote something there about how Democrats need to stop using only TV ads. I’m surprised that the first time I heard about this was on that podcast, because I would have thought that the shrieks and wails of anger and despondency from DC consultants would have been loud enough to hear across the country. Then, I tracked down a quote from that piece:

Reading that, I understood why the consultants aren’t afraid. They think they can make fat stacks helping their clients crank out cookie-cutter, unimaginative social media posts instead of cookie-cutter, unimaginative TV ads.

If you want to understand why this is dumb, Emily Amick, someone I don’t know anything about, wrote a pretty good piece that I can sum up as, “it’s the content, stupid.” Amick’s point is that Democrats need to say things that people want to hear, in an authentic way.

I want to go in a different direction than Amick, though, and talk about three generational political talents who have mastered social media: AOC, Zohran Mamdani and Claudia Sheinbaum.

AOC, interestingly enough, isn’t doing a lot on Bluesky or Twitter. Her main social media is Instagram, and her main mode there is reels. She posts really interesting stuff on her reels. My theory is that, at this point in her political career, she uses social media to keep her superfans in the loop. And there’s no content production studio involved. Unfortunately, Instagram is such a walled garden trash pile that I can’t link, but her reels yesterday included her walking down the street on her way to an endorsement meeting with a labor council, then she’s on a bike riding through the streets talking about the health care that Congress gets. It’s all shot on the fly from her phone, and it’s clearly off-the-cuff.

AOC is extremely shrewd and careful about when she posts to the other social media platforms. It’s usually a well-timed clapback to some criticism, or a rare, important note about some big news (example below). She also occasionally re-tweets, but, again, strategically:

The point here is that AOC has a massive social media following, she’s as close to a celebrity that the party has in DC, and her use of social media is both spontaneous and very calculated. There’s no way a consultant can replicate this. She’s lightning in a bottle.

Moving on to Mamdani and Claudia, they’re doing what I’ll call accomplishment-based social media. In yesterday’s post, Joe posted that charming video of Mamdani walking to City Hall and doing selfies with everyone. His posts also include him visiting city workers during a storm (and shoveling snow), information on pothole repair, and so on. He clearly has a social media team, but the guy is a star and a natural.

Of course, let’s not forget the absolute mastery shown by Claudia and her media team. Her selfie game is top-notch, and it’s always in service of accomplishments, like Mamdani:

That said, over holy week, the biggest holiday in Mexico, Claudia posted a video of her and one of the cats at the National Palace, and she’ll occasionally post a picture of her and her grandson during other holidays. So, like Mamdani and AOC, she’s a human being on her socials, and she leverages her unique style and appeal (mainly that she is genuinely adored by Mexicans).

So three generational political talents, each of them shrewdly using their social media to advance their political agenda, each is imaginative and creative. Mamdani and Claudia clearly have a social media team, but the tone for the content they produce is clearly led by Zohran and La Presidenta. AOC seems to mostly freelance her social media.

Are they operating like content creators? Nope, they have day jobs. Is their message being shaped by consultants who “train” them on how to use social media? I sincerely doubt it. Can this be trained? Maybe, but not by a bunch of old farts like Plouffe.

My point isn’t that only great politicians can make good use of social media. Instead, it’s that even the decent politicians can do it, but it has to be their authentic voice. And that can’t be coached, especially by a bunch of old white guys running consulting firms. If I were advising a politician, I’d tell them to talk to their kids, their grandkids, their nieces and nephews, and find out how they use and create stuff for social media. Then, using that knowledge, go out and speak in a few clear, declarative sentences about what they believe and what they want to accomplish. That last thing is the hard part, because the average Democratic politician has been trained to speak in lumpy mashed potato instead of simple declarative sentences.

This change is going to take a while, and David Plouffe isn’t going to lead us there.