Camouflage hats are common in rural northern Michigan, but the one that Willow Al-Shamma of Leelanau County put on when she left home on Halloween bore two names that folks in her deep red community would not likely wear—even as a costume.
“Harris-Walz”
The hat had been a gift from a friend and also featured the name of adjoining county “Grand Traverse” and two innocuous cherries, for which that part of the state is famous.
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Al-Shamma runs the TikTok account for the Grand Traverse County Democratic Party. Grand Traverse split nearly evenly between Democrats and Republicans in 2020.
The same is true of her home county, Leelanau, but she says the Democrats there tend to be wealthier and live on waterfront properties. She resides with her husband—also a Democrat—in the rural, working-class center of the county, which is overwhelmingly pro-Trump. And the names of the Democratic candidates for president and vice president make wearing it there a test of courage in historically fractious times.
“I was nervous going in the hat because it is a very conservative area,” Al-Shamma told the Daily Beast. “But I really feel like this election there’s a moral imperative.”
For the 49-year-old bookkeeper, women’s right and reproductive health care are key issues. Her 24-year-old daughter lives in Arizona, where she could be denied potentially life-saving measures if she became pregnant.
“It just feels like every single one of us needs to do our part,” Al-Shamma said. “And maybe that means just being brave and putting on your Harris-Walz hat and going in.”
When she strode into a local grocery store it seemed at first that some folks failed to notice her hat at all.
“I’m sure some people just thought it was your normal country camouflage hat,” she said. “Deer season is about to start here.”
She had paused in the meat department beside another woman when a small, but revelatory miracle occurred.
“We were just kind of both looking at like the meat,” Al-Shamma recalled “And, she looked right at me and she gave the thumbs up.”
Al-Shamma confirmed that she had not misunderstood the unexpected reaction. “I kind of pointed at the hat and she was thumbs-upping,” Al-Shamma recalled. “And it, it felt really good.”
Al-Shamma finished her shopping and proceeded to the check-out. She got another surprise from the woman at the register. “The cashier said, ‘I like your hat,’” Al-Shamma recalled.
She then went to pick up some take-out burgers at a tavern. She was waiting for the food when the woman handling the order did a double take.
“Like, ‘There’s a camo hat, like I’ve seen a million times... Oh wait, has Harris Walz on it,’” the woman seemed to be thinking.
The woman nodded and smiled, and gave Al-Shamma the “OK’ sign.
“So that was good,” Al-Shamma said.
Al-Shamma proceeded to a gas station and encountered a woman who in the past had covered her home, barn and yard with Trump and MAGA signs. Those had all vanished, but Al-Shamma did not know the woman well and was not sure what to make of it. What happened next was still unexpected.
“She saw my hat and she gave me a thumbs up and I was pretty shocked,” Al-Shamma recalled. “I pointed to Harris-Walz and she nodded her head and I almost immediately got teary.”
The two did not exchange so much as a word, and that only added to Al-Shamma’s feeling that a kind of sisterhood was forming far beyond her immediate community of fewer than 100. She stopped in her driveway and briefly postponed bringing in the burgers. She still wore the hat as she made a quick TikTok video.
“Guys, there’s something happening,” she began. “I think that the women of Michigan know that we need to protect our basic reproductive health and rights for us and our daughters and their daughters. And I think we’re gonna see that in the poll results, in the voting results here in Michigan.”
She added, “It feels different.”
Her TikTok post prompted hundreds of comments.
“I’m in a swing state and wear my gear daily,” wrote another Harris-Walz supporter. “I get waves from women in cars driving past, thumbs up at the market, winks from waiters… All gas, no brakes, ladies.”’
Back on Jan. 21, 2017, the day after the inaugural ceremony that marked the peaceful transfer of power from President Barack Obama to President Donald Trump, Al-Shamma joined The Women’s March in Washington, D.C..
“We were standing there before the march started and they had some speakers and they were a great distance away, but I heard this woman’s voice and I turned to my mom. I said, ‘Who is that?’” Al-Shamma recalled.
“Nobody knew who the voice was, but I could just tell that this was a woman of integrity, of intelligence and that she was a leader.”
Al-Shamma, who had voted for Hillary Clinton over Trump, then made a prediction. “I just said right there when I heard that voice, ‘She is going to be the first woman president of the United States,’” Al-Shamma recalled. “We learned later that it was Kamala Harris.”
This year, Al-Shamma’s daughter, mother and grandmother will all be voting for Harris.
“Four generations,” Al-Shamma noted.
As the election nears, Al-Shammas’s TikTok keeps drawing comments from other women who feel something happening. One response summed up what could be a deciding factor in the race said to be too close to call.
“The silent consensus. Women supporting women.”
Meanwhile, when she pulled out of her driveway to head out for a Walz rally in a bluer zone in Traverse City in the next county, she saw an eight-foot sign at the end of her street.
“TRUMP,” it read
Further on, there was a Trump rally with figures in red MAGA hats lining both sides of the road.
“When I first saw it, I thought, ‘Oh my God, they saw my TikTok,’” she said. “Then I said, ‘This has nothing to do with you’, and I just kept driving.”
