Here’s How Much Money the Biden Campaign Is Willing to Pay for a Meme Manager

With the November presidential elections nearing, President Joe Biden ‘s re-election campaign is trying to expand its substantial social media presence with a unique job posting. A listing for a ‘Partner Manager, Content and Meme Pages’ on the campaign ‘s website this week, caught the attention of netizens. The reelection team is looking to recruit someone who can manage the “day-to-day operations in engaging the internet’s top content and meme pages,” offering a salary of up to $85,000, Business Insider reported.

Meme pages on social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok, continue to be extremely popular, especially among Gen Z. For Biden, who has had trouble drawing in younger voters, this listing can prove to be a decisive strategy. According to recent polls, the younger generation is mostly unaware of the president’s initiatives to combat the current climate crisis, bring back abortion rights, and other key policies.

The Senior Adviser for Digital Persuasion for the Biden campaign, Clarke Humphrey, explained that the meme manager’s job will not be making memes but rather forming alliances with content providers who would then consent to make memes for the campaign, as per POLITICO . This move comes in light of the campaign’s iconic meme, ‘Dark Brandon’, being a hit after it was co-opted from right-wing influencers, who were using it for an expletive against the president.

To further advance his agenda, Biden has long promoted collaborations with content creators as part of his attempt to reach out to younger Americans, as per MSNBC . His administration has hired creators to help promote his policy victories and share knowledge about global affairs. Vice President, Kamala Harris ‘s, endearing comment, “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?” gave rise to a more recent viral meme, now frequently also used outside of a political context.

“We cannot dictate what any of these people publish, and we would never want to do that,” Humphrey said. “But what we are hoping to do is build relationships with the folks who run these accounts, share resources and brass tacks talking points with them so that they have the information they need.” The listing also aligns with the campaign’s successful attempts in 2020 to collaborate with well-known social media influencers, as Biden continued to show impressive results with younger voters.

However, intentionally creating a viral meme is a challenging task, since authenticity remains the currency of choice in digital politics. “All we’re trying to do is give them information about what Joe Biden has done, and what his plan is for a second term,” Humphrey said. He added that the goal is for meme-makers to then “take that information and figure out how it blends in with the other work that they’re doing.”