Dark Brandon haunts the Fox News website on GOP debate day

There’s no escaping him. “Dark Brandon,” Joe Biden’s undying alter ego, has appeared on everything from baseball caps to crop tops. Now, his menacing red eyes are staring out from the FoxNews.com homepage — where the first GOP presidential debate is set to stream later tonight. 

Throughout the entire day, Biden’s reelection team will be running an ad campaign featuring the meme on the Fox News website. The ads call attention to Biden’s campaign promises to protect abortion rights, lower the cost of prescription drugs, and defend social security, as first reported by People magazine Wednesday. 

“Tax cuts for yacht owners?” one ad reads. “Good luck with that, champ.”

For those unfamiliar with the lore, the “Dark Brandon” meme originated out of a conservative insult lobbed at the president during a NASCAR race in 2021. Racegoers yelling “Fuck Joe Biden” were misheard by a reporter as saying “Let’s go, Brandon,” and thus, a new slogan for Donald Trump supporters was born. 

But over the course of the last two years, the GOP’s beloved anti-Biden rallying cry has morphed into a boon for the president’s reelection campaign. Biden staffers and voters online embraced the joke to communicate that, yes, the 80-year-old was the bogeyman conservatives believed him to be, if only because he was successfully pushing through an agenda they hated.

While many people, myself included, have bemoaned the campaign’s incessant “Dark Brandon” deployment, the caricature seems to be working. Earlier this month, Axios reported that more than half of all the Biden reelection campaign’s merch sales have come from Brandon-themed items.

This is all to say that it’s unlikely the meme will disappear anytime soon. Hell, it’s only the beginning of the 2024 election season. “Dark Brandon,” love him or hate him, will return.