Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings donated $7 million to the Kamala Harris presidential campaign. Hastings’ donation to a PAC that’s supporting the Harris campaign is the largest donation the tech entrepreneur has ever made on behalf of one political candidate.
Hastings also took to social media, expressing his support on X, writing “Congrats to Kamala Harris – now it is time to win.”
Predictably, not everyone was pleased with Hastings, prompting a call for users to boycott the streaming platform, causing #CancelNetflix to trend. “Many of those calling for a boycott identified themselves as conservatives or supports of the MAGA movement on social media,” Newsweek reports.
One user, @TX_Vet_MAGA, said, “Just canceled @netflix due to @reedhastings $7 million political donation to Kamala Harris. #boycott #netflix #BoycottNetflix.”
This all transpired after many Hollywood A-listers, including Hastings, called on President Biden to suspend his campaign after his June 27 debate performance against former President Donald Trump. Biden bowed out of the race on July 21 and endorsed Harris. Hastings currently serves as executive chairman of the board for Netflix after stepping down from his role as CEO in 2023. He co-founded the streaming service in 1997, and while this large donation was noteworthy, it is not necessarily a deviation from his past actions. “Hastings and his wife have long been among the largest donors of the Democratic party.”
Similar to Hastings, LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman has been a stalwart Democratic donor, and also gave an endorsement to the Harris campaign. “Hoffman has already donated to the Biden-Harris cause — most recently for $923,000 in January — to the tune of $1.7 million. There will ostensibly be no more this cycle, however. ‘I’d already maxed out to Biden-Harris,’” said Hoffman.
Of note, Trump also has the support from prominent businessman “billionaires such as Elon Musk, Bill Ackman and JP Morgan CEO,” who have all publicly backed his 2024 campaign.
Should the boycott pickup steam what could it mean for Netflix? For perspective, according to a November 2022 survey conducted by Statista, “the frequency of Netflix use varied depending on ethnicity.” Survey findings indicated that Black respondents were the highest percentage of daily users, standing at 42%, versus their white counterparts at 23%.
Vice president of diverse insights and partnership at Nielsen Charlene Polite Corley said, “When it comes to the media consumption of Black America, it really just means content is key to our culture…‘Have you seen this show? Have you heard this album? Stream this latest hit.’ Those are forms of cultural cachet.”
And with regard to Black content, Netflix reigns supreme. Renowned director Ava DuVernay has even called the platform “the foremost and most robust distributor of Black images in the world.”
Examining similar instances of outrage against “wokeness” and progressive values indicates that no, this latest conservative rallying cry will not necessarily have the ability to impact Netflix’s bottom line. A Rolling Stone analysis revealed that “major brands tend to easily weather anti-woke furor.” For instance, in 2021 after “United Airlines planned for half of its incoming pilot trainees to be women and/or people of color,” conservative pundit Tucker Carlson complained that United executives were “ideologues, suffering from an incurable brain disease called ‘wokeness.” As for the aftermath, just two years later, in 2023, the airline reported record profits for the fourth quarter of 2022, upwards of $840 million, with expected profits continuing as the demand for United flights remained high.
Fundraising for the Harris campaign continues break campaign records. In less than 24 hours after Biden announced his withdrawal from the race onJuly 21, the Harris campaign “raised $81 million…the most for a single day in the 2024 campaign for either party.”
As of July 29, the Harris campaign has raised more than $200 million, “despite Harris not yet being officially declared the Democrats’ nominee.”