The Curious Case of Lindy Li
How did a “Blue MAGA” influencer and fundraiser turn on Democrats so fast?
LAST MARCH, I FOUND MYSELF SITTING in a White House briefing with two dozen pro-Democratic digital creators, listening to high-level administration officials preview President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address.
Among the handful of administration leaders who briefed the room was Anita Dunn, at the time one of Biden’s most powerful consiglieres. It was pretty conventional stuff. She spent a few minutes talking us through the president’s remarks and answering questions from starry-eyed social media influencers who planned on publishing content cheering on the speech the next day.
I was attending on behalf of my then-employer, a pro-democracy media company, and knew most of those in attendance. There were some political YouTubers, a few up-and-coming Democratic TikTok stars, and a cohort of folks from other emerging news outlets like MeidasTouch and Betches Media. But there was one attendee I didn’t recognize: a woman named Lindy Li.
Li had earned an invite to the White House that day by being a very energetic Democratic personality on cable news, and for having grown an audience of over 300,000 followers on X by shooting off hyperpartisan, pro-Democrat, red-meat content. One example of her style and approach came in a tweet she authored in 2022: “When push comes to shove, Democrats take care of you regardless of party. Republicans try to get you murdered.”
A former congressional candidate, Li had also held various fundraising roles in the past for Democratic candidates and the national party committee.
She was, if nothing else, a reliable party ally. And at the White House gathering that day, she played a similar role. She did not waste an opportunity to shower praise on Biden and the administration writ large, and proudly display her unwavering gratitude and support for the White House. She was the classic attendee who raises a hand to ask a question, but instead launches into some unrelated speech about whatever happens to be on her mind.
At one point, Li delivered a mini-lecture declaring how much she loved Joe Biden, while offering up her various credentials, including that the governor of Pennsylvania had named her to some commission. While some creators in attendance asked Dunn questions about the White House’s economic messaging, Li made sure White House officials recognized she was a team player. “Teacher’s pet. . .” one of my friends in the room texted from underneath the table.
Throughout the rest of the year, I kind of forgot about Li, having dismissed her as just another “Blue MAGA” Twitter person. For months, she continued enthusiastically to support Biden, and later Kamala Harris, both on cable news and X, where she would tweet predictable messages of support for their campaigns. By August, she said she had raised several million dollars for the Democratic ticket.
Her social media accounts became filled with adoring posts featuring herself at events with the president, vice president, and other top Democratic elected officials like former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. “There will never be another like her,” she said of Pelosi. She also was part of the Pennsylvania delegation to the Democratic National Convention this summer.
Then, after Election Day, Li was suddenly everywhere. But instead of maintaining her overeager support for Biden and Harris, she adopted a new persona, eagerly attacking Democrats and the campaign nonstop. In this new role as a Biden and Harris antagonist, she has been quoted or mentioned in the mainstream press hundreds of times and become a fixture on Fox News.
Appearing on Fox in mid-December, Li declared that Biden was in “no shape” to carry out his duties as commander-in-chief. “The president has not been cognitively fit to assume the duties of the Oval Office for a number of years now,” Li told Fox’s Kevin Corke.
It was a wild turnaround from her effusive praise of the man and her defense of his age and cognition just months prior. In fact, Li was a frequent and outspoken critic of journalists who covered the president’s age issue. “To those of you who said Biden was cognitively impaired . . . WE AWAIT YOUR APOLOGY,” Li tweeted in March.
When Biden ultimately dropped out of the race in July, Li told Fox that if Democrats skipped over Kamala Harris in favor of another candidate to lead the ticket, it would be “a catastrophic mistake.” She urged her followers to “unify behind Kamala Harris.”
Here too, Li has seemingly changed her tune. Days after the election, she told Fox that Biden’s endorsement of Harris was “an F-You to the party.”
THE LIST OF POST-ELECTION reversals goes on: Li now claims that she “has been a conservative all my life,” that Pelosi is “notorious” for “insider trading,” that Democrats are to blame for failing to secure the southern border, that there will be a “new era of prosperity” under Donald Trump, and that “The markets & consumer confidence have been booming under Pres. Trump[.] Americans are loving his transition.” She also called Democrats “delusional,” said the Democratic party was like “a cult.” She referred to Pete Hegseth, whom Trump tapped for secretary of defense despite allegations of sexual assault, alcohol abuse, and financial corruption, as “a pretty good guy.”
Democratic digital creators who joined Li at the White House briefing last March have dismissed her recent shift as cringeworthy opportunism. “She’s a liar and a clout chaser!” tweeted Kenneth Walden, a pro-Harris TikTok creator. “It’s very clear where this is going,” remarked journalist Aaron Rupar. Democratic strategist and YouTuber Keith Edwards tweeted “How long until she’s wearing a MAGA hat?”
“We have people who want attention, pick a side, say things to get in a room, and then when things get tough, they’re the first people to dip,” Edwards told me recently. “I don’t think she believes in anything.”
LI WAS HAPPY TO ADDRESS her critics in a brief interview with me last week. “I haven’t switched parties. I’m not a Republican. I’m not out for anything, I would never work for the government, and who would I even get a contract from?,” she said. She defended her change of heart on the president’s age issue by noting that it happened after the June 27 debate between Biden and Trump. “After the debate I stopped defending his cognitive fitness. You will notice that I never said anything about that post-debate.”
But even here, Li seems to be casually disregarding her very public past. In a tweet she authored two weeks after the debate, she attacked critics of the president’s age. That tweet has recently been deleted.
Flip-flopping is hardly a new phenomenon in American politics. Trump has perfected it. So too have his hangers-on (see: Gabbard, Tulsi). But Li’s head-spinning pivot still illustrates a broader trend we’ll see escalate in the years to come.
Our tribal political culture creates remarkable incentives for those who defect from one side to another. The act of defection is treated by the party to whom the defector has gone as an affirmation of their cause. The defector is not only lavished with praise and love from those new party members but loads of attention from allied media, who reward shamelessness with more coverage and clout. For example, Fox News producers and bookers, knowing friendly fire can help drive ratings, love to feature Democratic voices willing to turn on their own.
I asked Li specifically about Fox News, and whether she was being paid for her appearances, or whether she was in conversations to become a contributor for the network, as some of her critics have assumed.
“I’m not going to discuss any conversations that I've had with private individuals, but I have not been paid a single dime by anybody for telling the truth,” said Li. “Not even a penny.” Pressed further, she clarified that she was not currently “in discussions with any executives at Fox News.”
But her sudden celebrity, whether compensated or not, doesn’t change the fact that the media incentivizes this type of behavior.
As online political creators become more mainstream—sometimes more even than the legacy political press—more like Li will emerge. Many political creators’ entire personas and livelihoods rely on “feeding the beast” more content—and more controversy.
Relevance is more important than ideological consistency. And as the bizarre evolution of Lindy Li shows, being willing to say just about anything may be the political attribute that matters most.
“We’re in a post-shame culture now,” said Edwards.
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