Last week, mayoral candidate Maya Wiley made her first foray into Clubhouse, the new invite-only social media app that allows users to wander into themed-rooms and have or listen-in on conversations with one another. Like its name, the app feels like a throwback, a 21st-century reincarnation of those 1980s telephone party lines that had bored and curious teens racking up their parents' phone bills.
However, as one of New York City's leading mayoral hopefuls, Wiley was on Clubhouse to campaign. That night, she was the special guest in a room hosted by Tiffinni Young, a former Dallas City Councilwoman who uses the app to bring together Black women in politics. Speaking with a Texas twang, Young quizzed Wiley on a range of topics, many of which were much broader than the targeted policy questions she's been fielding as a candidate.
Although they had never met, the two women quickly forged a connection; Wiley revealed that her mother was born in Abilene, they were both enthusiastic members of the same sorority, Delta Sigma Theta. Asked for advice she would give to Black women running for office, Wiley, the former civil rights attorney, said, "Know your power and know your partnerships." She then explained, "People are going to question you no matter how qualified you are." To which Young responded: "Amen."
By the end of their hour-long talk, Young made a heartfelt plea for donors and volunteers across the country to help Wiley. "She can't win this race without all of us supporting her," she said.
All told, the room had around 70 listeners.
In this pandemic era, Clubhouse offers the possibility of kinship but with the air of exclusivity: not only must users receive an invitation to join, the app currently only works on an iPhone. At last count, it has around 10 million active users, up from 2 million in January. Facebook, by comparison, has 2.8 billion users worldwide. Still, celebrities and billionaires alike—Tiffany Haddish, Drake, Elon Musk, and Oprah, to name a few—have joined the new platform. Unlike Instagram and Twitter videos, the calls are not recorded, allowing users to somewhat let their guard down. Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg once dropped into a room spontaneously.
For Silicon Valley and the famous, the app seems to be a yet another way to flex their influence.
So it’s not unusual that New York City political candidates are joining Clubhouse, too. According to Monica Klein, a Democratic political consultant, candidates and their campaigns are always looking for new ways to reach voters.
Klein, who previously worked on Mayor Bill de Blasio's 2013 campaign, cited his participation in a Reddit forum. De Blasio at the time told Redditors that family members had told him "how important Reddit is to them and how much news and insight they get from it." He solicited more than 400 comments.
COVID, which has forced people indoors, has made the search for voter engagement even more intense.
The use of Clubhouse, Klein said, is "really a sign that people are looking for any way possible to talk to voters at a time when you can't be face to face,"
Neal Kwatra, another Democratic political consultant, agreed.
Kwatra, who uses Clubhouse, said the app is also good for tapping into an existing network of people with certain policy interests and political ideas.
"Like a lot of platforms, it can be a repository for creative organizing for volunteers and the most engaged supporters," he said.
All eight leading mayoral candidates have become members of Clubhouse, although their level of participation varies. City Comptroller Scott Stringer, for example, is yet to go on the platform. Shaun Donovan's campaign indicated that Donovan would use the Clubhouse more in the coming weeks as part of a plan to expand his digital outreach.
Not surprisingly, former tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang has been among the more active Clubhouse users.
Part of the appeal for the campaign, which tries to exude a tech-savvy vibe, is the newness of Clubhouse. Avery Kim, Yang's social media manager, said, "If you’re running for office just on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, you’re missing the moment."
She added: "Giving New Yorkers a real-time, audible connection to speak directly with Andrew on the issues they care about has been really powerful. People want to feel heard, and they want an immediate, genuine reaction, and Clubhouse creates an environment for both."
Ray McGuire also counts himself as a Clubhouse fan. His campaign has integrated the app into their schedule of social media events, according to Antonya Jeffrey, a spokesperson for his campaign.
Jeffrey said McGuire was introduced to Clubhouse by Felicia Horowitz, a Black philanthropist whose husband Ben Horowitz is an investor in the social media app. The former is the host of a club called "Saturday-night dinner parties," which draws prominent Black individuals from entertainment, sports and business.
McGuire, a former investment banker, has even spoken with the company's CEO Paul Davison to understand his vision of the platform, Jeffrey said.
In a statement, McGuire said, "When I'm on Clubhouse, I feel like I'm in a room with my close friends and all of New York is listening. The immediate feedback I get on policy and plans to rebuild New York City from a large group of New Yorkers at once is energizing."
Eric Adams has been a guest on Clubhouse four times so far. The Brooklyn Borough President has spoken to clubs covering a range of interests, from Music Industry Execs and to Behind the Money, which focuses on small businesses and entrepreneurs.
“Clubhouse is the new living room for meet and greets with candidates," said Evan Thies, a campaign spokesperson. "The great thing about the format is that it makes it easy for anyone to get access to candidates and ask their questions."
Kathryn Garcia joined Clubhouse in late February after receiving an invitation from the New York Power & Politics Club to discuss bagels. Garcia, the city's former sanitation commissioner who grew up in New York City, has been praised for, among other things, her bagel order and the extent to which she will defend the city's bagel superiority.
She now drops in once a week. "We call it her office hours," said Lindsey Green, a spokesperson for Garcia's campaign.
Unlike Zoom, candidates don't have to worry about their physical appearance or the potential for “resting Zoom face.”
"There’s a lot of Zoom fatigue, a lot of video," Green said. "Having just the audio is nice and kinda relaxing. It’s casual, it’s conversational."
But the open nature of the Clubhouse rooms can also lead to occasional moments of awkwardness.
Last Friday, during a conversation about food insecurity in New York City, one female user asked Garcia if the coronavirus vaccines stopped a woman's menstrual cycle and her ability to have children. Garcia began by saying that she was not a medical professional, before the moderator interjected by telling the woman that she was in the wrong room and should ask that question elsewhere. (For the record: Experts have said there is no connection between the vaccines and infertility.)
But to some, those kinds of interactions may be a small price to having better access to those seeking the city's highest office.
"One of the imperatives of our democracy is that people feel close to their leadership, and that there's not a whole bureaucracy preventing them from being heard," said Art Chang, a former managing director at JPMorgan Chase who is also running in the Democratic primary.
Chang, who drops in on Clubhouse three times a week, likened the experience to "standing on a street corner and having random friends come up and talk to you."
Like others, he said that he was struck by the diversity of Clubhouse members. It has been called the must-have app for Black creators.
"It feels quite democratic and open to me," he said.
However, Dianne Morales, the most left-leaning candidate in the race, challenged that premise.
"It’s diversity in the world of iPhone owners," she said.
She added she wanted to "live by my values of reaching the people generally not part of the conversation."
Morales did concede that Clubhouse was a "pleasant respite from Zoom." She has hosted one conversation on the platform and participated in several events, according to her campaign.
Shortly after speaking to Gothamist on Tuesday, she announced that she would no longer participate in online forums.
"This race will not be won on Zoom," she wrote in a Medium post. She added: "We aren’t going to let systems that weren’t designed for us dictate how we move forward."
Still, the timing of her decision made it less of a risk. All of the candidates have been moving back to traditional boots-on-the-ground campaigning as the weather warms and more New Yorkers get vaccinated.
Kwatra said the sustainability of Clubhouse will be tested as the pandemic subsides in a city where many people are starved for human contact.
"There's a real open question around a platform that isn’t conducive to gathering together in person together," he said.
Correction: A prior version of this story incorrectly stated the Clubhouse CEO that Ray McGuire met with. It was Paul Davison, not Kurt Schrader.
