Kamala Harris spurs meme frenzy on social media as Biden endorses her

As Joe Biden announced he would be ending his bid for re-election, and endorsed Kamala Harris as his successor in the presidential contest, social media did what social media is best known to do.

Related: Who will replace Joe Biden as Democratic nominee? Here are six possibilities

Truth to be told, social media users had been enthusiastically imagining Harris’s ascension to the top of the Democratic ticket since Biden’s disastrous debate performance at the end of June. Harris dancing. Harris laughing. Clips resurfaced and were remixed of Harris telling a story in 2023, about her mother saying to her as a child: “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?”, with Harris adding: “You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you.” It became an instant meme at the time. “The arc of the coconut tree is long, but it bends towards justice,” one person tweeted following Biden’s announcement.

The next weeks will make clear whether Harris will be the Democrats’ 2024 nominee for president. But in the meantime, the internet picked up where it had left off.

The sports news outlet Deadspin portrayed Harris as though she were the Mets’ Edwin Diaz taking the mound to save the game.

Harris, others argued, was the “Momala” the US needs.

As #MAMALA2024 began to trend, so did Madam President. An ad from Harris’s bid for vice-president resurfaced, showing the disparities between Harris and Trump as her new political rival.

Social media even had an answer for the question of who would be Harris’s running mate:

Read more about Joe Biden dropping out of the 2024 election:

• Joe Biden drops out and endorses Kamala Harris

• Democrats praise Biden and Republicans go on the offense

• Who will replace Biden? How does the process work?

• A look back at Joe Biden’s life in politics