The GIF Enters the Campaign Playbook

2016

Hillary Clinton's shimmy at the first 2016 presidential debate. The shoulder-shake became one of the defining political reaction GIFs of the campaign within minutes. Place: Twitter, primarily; campaign accounts on both sides Figures: Hillary Clinton campaign social-media team · Trump campaign accounts · the 4chan and Reddit pro-Trump meme operations · the ADL classifications team The 2016 US presidential cycle is the first in which both major-party campaigns deploy reaction GIFs systematically. The Hillary Clinton account posts a Joe Biden side-eye in response to a Trump tweet; the Trump account posts Pepe variants; both run organized GIF-meme operations alongside the conventional ad spend. By the general election, the format is in formal campaign social-media playbooks at both party committees. What had been forum vocabulary in 2007 (see [[somethingawful-image-macros-2002]]) is now appearing in the official Twitter feeds of major-party presidential candidates. The medium has fully crossed from subculture to power.