Move over, MAGA hats: Gov. Tim Walz’s camouflage ballcap has entered the chat and it’s quickly becoming the hottest fashion accessory of the summer, having the potential to topple Donald Trump’s stronghold on meme-to-merchandise election wear.
When U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris introduced Walz as her running mate on Tuesday, she celebrated the pick with a reality dating show-inspired Instagram Reel that showed her placing a call to Walz, who picked up on the other end from his St. Paul, Minn., home wearing a pair of khakis and his customary camouflage hat.
“I would be honoured, Madam Vice President,” Walz replied, accepting the invite to become the official Democratic vice-presidential candidate.
Immediately, the Midwestern dad and former high school football coach spawned what felt like a thousand memes, with supporters comparing him to this moment’s hottest pop star and fellow Midwesterner, Chappell Roan, who is selling a similar hat to fans.
In a nimble move, handily proving they can keep up with internet culture, the Harris-Walz campaign was selling an official camo-print hat in the Harris Victory Fund online store less than 12 hours later, emblazoned with “Harris Walz” text in hunter orange.
The item’s description read: “You asked, we answered. The most iconic political hat in America.”
Roan herself took notice of the speedy turnaround shortly after, posting an image of the side-by-side comparison of the hats with the caption “Is this real(?)”
It is. The campaign confirmed to Teen Vogue that the union-made headwear sold out of its first 3,000 hats in 30 minutes. As of Thursday afternoon, sales of the US$40 hat were nearing $2 million.
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“They sold 25,000 hats in a few hours,” Mitch Cahn, the president and founder of Unionwear, the company manufacturing all merchandise from the Harris-Walz campaign, told Women’s Wear Daily about the skyrocketing sales
“We were completely surprised by it. We’ve been in business for 32 years. We never had an instance where we made a sample in the morning and then they had sold a million dollars’ worth of hats by the next morning,” he said.
“We’ve been making this camo hat for years for hunters, for people in the Midwest. The idea that this hat would appeal to fans of Chappell Roan and Midwestern hunters is probably why the campaign picked it, because it has a really, really broad appeal and brings people together,” Cahn continued. “Obviously the sales and the demand for it and the excitement about the hat speak for itself.”
FILE – Tim Walz has a long history of wearing his camo hat. Here he is, in 2016, speaking to a crowd at the University of Minnesota Duluth.
Tom Williams / CQ Roll Call
Cahn also noted to USA Today that while his Unionwear hasn’t made any merchandise for the Trump campaign in the last two election cycles, they were responsible for the original run of the now instantly recognizable, red “Make America Great Again” hats in 2016. The initial Kamala-Walz hat demand, he said, exceeds the initial demand for MAGA hats at that time.
When a campaign hat is more than merch
A camouflage hat appears to be a natural and strategic fit for the campaign store — Walz has long touted his abilities as a hunter and the Harris campaign strategy is surely looking to amplify Walz’s quintessential Midwestern persona to appeal to rural voters and Americans living in swing states.
Derek Guy, the fashion journalist and “menswear guy” behind the ubiquitous X account @dieworkwear, notes that seizing on Walz’s penchant for dressing down is a smart strategy for the Democrats.
“That’s where Walz has a fashionable — or perhaps helpfully unfashionable — advantage: With his flannel-lined LL Bean barn coats, scuffed work boots and woodsy camo caps, Walz is one of the few male politicians who looks normal in the kind of unpretentious clothing many voters prefer to wear themselves,” Guy noted in a piece for Politico.
“The choice to put Walz in casual wear, and introduce woodsman camo campaign merch shortly after the announcement, suggests the Harris team is keenly aware of how clothing impacts the governor’s blue-collar brand.”
Guy also notes that Walz has the benefit of authenticity on his side, unlike some politicians who look like they’re cosplaying various roles when they dress down for more casual events: “His hunting get-ups don’t look contrived because he’s an actual hunter.”
Not everyone is impressed with introduction of the camo cap. The executive director for National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action, Randy Kozuch, told the Washington Post that “a camo hat can’t camouflage the fact that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are gun-grabbing radicals who support confiscating firearms from law-abiding hunters and gun owners.”
Walz, despite being a hunter, has spent much of his political career advocating for stricter gun laws and as governor he signed a bill that featured universal background checks and a red-flag law.
Emily L. Newman, a professor of art history and liberal studies at Texas A&M University at Commerce, argues that the viral hat, combined with the Walz persona the campaign is leaning into, lends credibility to Walz’s fight for gun regulation.
“I thought it was a great campaign move to cash in on what Walz brings to the campaign, which is this Midwestern sensibility,” Newman told the Washington Post. “He’s talked about being a hunter, but then he’s such a staunch advocate for gun control that it’s a great thing to play up for the Democrats.”
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