Why Democrats are pivoting to thirst traps

“It is a very real dynamic that you could have all these videos about Jon Ossoff, and it's not seen as detracting away from his overall message or his seriousness as a politician,” The 19th’s Grace Panetta said on Vox’s Today, Explained podcast. | Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images Democrats have been emphasizing lots of issues in the runup to the 2026 midterms: The Iran war. The state of the economy and healthcare. Corruption. And…hotness. Specifically, their candidates: The internet is awash in clips of Michigan candidate Abdul El-Sayed pumping iron and podcasters proclaiming that “America deserves a hot president” in a video interspersed with photos of Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff. Having a good-looking candidate is by no means a new tactic — famously, it may have helped John F. Kennedy win election over Richard Nixon — but the online left is adapting that strategy for the internet and fandom age.  Grace Panetta, a politics reporter for The 19th, wrote about how “thirst edits” of Ossoff in particular are proliferating online. Panetta says the organic origins of a lot of these videos are of particular interest to Democratic operatives, who see it as a way to gain back ground they lost on the internet after the...