TikTok, TikTok. That’s the sound of time running out for the old new way of doing politics. Donald Trump was the United States’ last traditional media president. Should she make it to the White House, Kamala Harris would be the first president created by the social media age.

If Trump ever dwells on regrets, the sustained pressure he and his campaign put on Joe Biden must be one of the greatest. With a frail and fading President Biden as his foil, candidate Trump looked vigorous and inevitable. Just a fortnight ago, the image of Trump exhorting Americans to “fight” after surviving an assassination attempt was the greatest catalysing force in US politics.

But now the media president, who - loved or hated - has always been irresistible to audiences and, hence, to the media which serves them, has met his match. Harris, firming as the Democrats’ pick to succeed Biden in the presidential race, is TikTok catnip. Video killed the radio star.

The Republicans are in a proper pickle. They need to get her on policy but they’re obsessed with her person. Yet all their personal attack lines somehow break in Harris’ favour. In fact they’re going viral among the TikTok generation. And TikTok has an unprecedented ability to get young people to go out and buy - Stanley cups, jorts, gig tickets and now, maybe, the next head honcho of the USA.

One of the most popular memes is Harris’s laugh - or “cackle”, as the Republicans have branded it. The Vice President bellows while throwing her head back - and she does it a lot.

This has been used to suggest she’s unserious, lacking the gravitas required of high office. But you know something? People love her fun persona. And when she went on the Drew Barrymore show in April she imbued her laugh, and the negative response to it, with a message that resonates for women of all ages. “Apparently some people love to talk about the way I laugh,” she told the actress-turned-talk show host. “Well let me tell you something. I have my mother’s laugh. And I grew up around a bunch of women who laughed from the belly … it’s really important to us to remind each other and our younger ones: don’t be confined to other people’s perception … [of] how you should act in order to be.”

The clip has gone viral on TikTok and been reshared across every social media channel, except perhaps Donald Trump’s owned platform Truth Social.

Similarly, Harris dancing. The woman can move and she’s not afraid to. She looks like someone you’d want along at your party, whether you agree with her on immigration or not. Gen Z is doing its own fan edits of her groove and Trump just can’t seem to stop the music.