Ten years after Hillary Clinton urged voters to “Pokémon Go to the polls,” the line remains a fixture of Election Day online. What began as a joke during her 2016 presidential campaign has become a recurring meme, used both to poke fun at Democrats and to express a shared sense of embarrassment among liberals.
Clinton made the remark at a rally in Virginia while talking about jobs in infrastructure, coding and app development. “I don’t know who created Pokémon Go, but I’m trying to figure out how we get them to have Pokémon Go to the polls,” she said. The comment quickly drew attention online for sounding awkward and out of touch, according to Philadelphia ward committee member Cesar Ruiz de Castilla, who spoke to TechCrunch.
The meme’s staying power also reflects how much political life has become intertwined with online culture. Since 2016, campaigns have hired meme managers, the White House has invited creators and podcasters to press briefings, and Donald Trump has used social media as a prominent part of his political presence. Organizer Memes, an influencer who teaches Gen Z activists to reach peers online, described the phrase as a relic of a more optimistic political era and a time when a smaller number of platforms shared content among one another.
For some younger people, 2016 has taken on nostalgic significance as a time before AI-generated online content and algorithmic feeds became so prominent. At the start of the year, throwback photos from 2016 spread widely on Instagram. Spotify also reported a 790% increase in user-created playlists with 2016 in their titles during the first three weeks of the year.
The phrase has outlasted other cultural references from that period, including the internet’s fascination with Harambe, the gorilla, Organizer Memes told TechCrunch. Its regular return on Election Day may help explain why: the joke can carry different meanings for different audiences while remaining recognizable across political divides.
The meme also has a more earnest side. It can encourage people to make time to vote while acknowledging frustration with politicians who may seem disconnected from younger voters’ lives online. Its irony leaves room for cynicism, but the underlying message remains a direct appeal to friends: go vote.
Sources: TechCrunch.