If you assume he’s aiming for Warren’s seat, the chances seem pretty slim in a progressive state like ours, despite the more-conservative western regions. But what if the goal also has to do with a longer-range right-wing plan, one that’s potentially more disruptive to the status quo—and more harmful to Warren herself?
So far, Ayyadurai has built a community of followers and supporters, many of the same ilk that helped elect Trump and would want to see him reelected. Increasingly, he’s closed ranks with the leaders of these political misfits, finding allies including Mike Cernovich, a right-wing social media celebrity who made his name through his men’s self-improvement website before tipping into political commentary, lashing out against feminists and promoting conspiracy theories in tweets and videos. “People who meet Shiva are excited,” Cernovich tells me. “He is charismatic and inspirational. He needs to do a video message every day because the more people see him, the more they like him. He’s fearless and committed.” Jeff Giesea, one of the minds behind the social media army that helped elect Trump, also cohosted Ayyadurai’s political coming-out party.
Cernovich and Giesea both have direct ties to right-wing social media warfare. In 2016, for instance, the two partnered on an operation to spread Breitbart News content and hostile memes on Twitter in an effort to help Trump. Media outlets have also speculated about Ayyadurai’s ties to another Trump supporter and backroom operator, billionaire venture capitalist and techno-libertarian Peter Thiel, who reportedly donated more than $1 million to Trump’s campaign and later served on the president’s transition team. Famous for investing in Facebook early, Thiel also financed Hulk Hogan’s successful $31 million defamation lawsuit against Gawker last year. Afterward, Gawker’s founder, Nick Denton, publicly questioned whether Thiel was secretly involved in other lawsuits against his company, including the case filed by Ayyadurai. Was it pure coincidence, Denton wondered, that Hogan and Ayyadurai shared the same attorney?
In response, both Thiel and Ayyadurai have denied knowing each other. Ayyadurai released a statement saying, “If it is Peter Thiel who made that representation possible, I am very grateful. Although I have had no contact whatsoever with Peter Thiel and my attorney has never mentioned him to me, I would certainly like to shake Peter Thiel’s hand.” It’s interesting to note that Thiel has used some of the same quirky verbiage as Ayyadurai, once decrying the system of higher education as a “priestly class of professors that doesn’t do very much work.”
Given Ayyadurai’s association with the Breitbart-Trump set, it’s possible his candidacy is also about undermining the system as we know it—and inflicting damage on Warren for a 2020 presidential run—by testing which messages work on blue-state voters and which narratives stick. If so, he’s not alone. Colin Reed, executive director of the Republican fringe group America Rising, has said his organization is tracking Warren’s public appearances and building a file of opposition research to develop “communications angles to damage her 2020 prospects…. The earlier you start, the more you do when you start, it can be a political death by a thousand cuts.”
As she did during her 2012 race against Scott Brown, Warren is asking her Republican opponents to sign a so-called People’s Pledge, banning spending by outside groups. Without it, Ayyadurai’s campaign would seem a fertile place for right-wing Republican and libertarian donors to park their political cash. The same goes for the rest of the Republican field, including state Representative Geoff Diehl, who backed Trump and has begun attacking Warren. John Kingston, a wealthy businessman and GOP donor, is also seriously considering a run, as is former Navy SEAL Gabriel Gomez. (Ayyadurai has filed a statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission, and state nomination papers will be available next February.) “The MassGOP looks forward to vigorously challenging Elizabeth Warren,” party spokesperson Terry MacCormack says, “and will continue to make the case that her record of hyper-partisan obstructionism is wrong for Massachusetts.”
Meanwhile, Democratic operatives don’t seem to be taking Ayyadurai’s chances seriously. “Massachusetts has a history of supporting outsiders,” says Joe Caiazzo, a Boston-based Democratic strategist who served as political director for both the Sanders and Hillary Clinton campaigns in Rhode Island. “However, the foundation in the recipe for success is largely rooted in directly speaking to the concerns of its residents. This is a space that is firmly occupied by the senator.” He might be right. Even if Ayyadurai emerges from the primary victorious, he will be tasked with unseating the new face of the national Democratic Party, an incumbent with a formidable knack for fundraising, in one of only two states where not a single county went red in the 2016 presidential election.
Not surprisingly, this only encourages Warren’s opposition. To the delight of the right, Ayyadurai offers a stinging rebuke to the identity politics of the left. His is a rags-to-riches immigrant story, one that Democrats cannot lay claim to. In return, he’s found a constituency that sees him as he sees himself: a brilliant inventor who is being denied rightful credit for one of the most important inventions of the modern era, and a victim of the know-it-all class of insiders. Even better, he’s found believers who are willing to fight alongside him.
Standing in the lobby of the Lexington Community center following Ayyadurai’s speech, I watch the candidate’s smile twist into a mischievous grin as he remembers that an anti-Trump, left-wing group called Minuteman Indivisible is also meeting in the building. I can almost see the gears in his head move at lightning speed. The community center closes in 15 minutes, so he moves to confront his ideological opponents as they exit down the stairwell. Armed with his leaflets, Ayyadurai begins putting them in people’s hands. An older woman wastes little time shredding hers in Ayyadurai’s face, while his assistant follows along with an iPhone camera rolling.
A bell sounds throughout the building and a voice comes over the intercom: May I have your attention, please. It is now 8:50, and the community center closes promptly at 9. Please wrap up your activity. In no time, Ayyadurai brings the fight outside.
“I’m the darkie you can’t control!” he cries. “You’re talking to me as though I work for you! You’re talking to me as though I am below you.” Then, shouting over a woman, he starts in on Warren’s Native American ancestry and accuses her of being brainwashed. A bystander, also filming the encounter, grows concerned for the woman’s safety and asks somebody to call Lexington Police, but the two sides soon scatter.
Afterward, two women from Minuteman Indivisible stand in the darkened parking lot, visibly shaken. At the other end, Ayyadurai and his retinue fire up the bus and share a hearty laugh. The candidate is off and running.
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