Kamala Harris may be skipping Joe Rogan, but she’s sidestepping the most popular podcaster in the world for a last-ditch effort to win over a group the polls say she’s struggling with—Black men—by booking a sit down with NFL legend Shannon Sharpe on Club Shay Shay. The vice president’s episode of the video podcast will air on Monday, Oct. 28, according to CBS News.
Sharpe’s Shay Shay is known for interviews with celebrities who have a bone to pick, and getting them to air their dirty laundry in juicy, long-form tell-alls that are often shared far and wide. His selection of guests is aimed at Black listeners, and the show pulls in 2 million podcast downloads and 40 million YouTube views a month, according to Shorty Awards.
Harris’ interview on the show is likely to coincide with the release of Trump’s sit-down with Rogan, whose audience far outnumbers Sharpe’s—with The Joe Rogan Experience at 17.5 million YouTube subscribers vs. Club Shay Shay at 3.6 million. Rogan is consistently Apple and Spotify’s number one podcast.
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That said, it’s likely the kind of listeners Harris is aiming for that attracted her to Sharpe’s show.
Oscar-winning Actress and comedian Mo’Nique aired her grievances with Tiffany Haddish, Oprah Winfrey, Tyler Perry, and more during her time on Shay Shay. Meagan Good sat down with Sharpe amid the controversy over her relationship with actor and convicted domestic violence offender Jonathan Majors.
Perhaps most famously, Katt Williams came to the show and took aim at Kevin Hart and several other comedians in a 166-minute conversation that has since been viewed 81 million times on YouTube. And there are many more who come to the show to clear the air (or stoke the flames) during the most heated times for their public personas.
As such, Sharpe’s show is not somewhere one might expect a presidential candidate to appear—if it weren’t for Harris’ previous stops on unconventional platforms. Following other appeals to Black voters on The Breakfast Club and The Shade Room, Sharpe’s show will be yet another attempt for Harris to “reach Black Americans where they are at and engage with Black communities across the country through diverse mediums on the issues that matter most to them,” as Harris’ media director put it to NBC, in the final days before the election.
As for her interviewer, Sharpe is a former tight end who played 14 seasons in the NFL for the Denver Broncos and Baltimore Ravens before retiring in 2003 as a three-time Super Bowl champion and Hall of Famer. He started a career as a sportscaster after his retirement, on CBS Sports and Fox Sports 1, before launching Shay Shay in 2020. He hosts the show simultaneously while co-hosting ESPN’s First Take.
Sharpe recently came under fire for streaming the audio of a sexual encounter on Instagram Live, after which he claimed he was “hacked” before admitting that the stream was real, but an accident. Though the internet had a field day with the footage, Sharpe escaped the debacle without repercussions from ESPN.
On Shay Shay, Sharpe has been criticized for his approach to interviewing, drawing backlash for being “uninformed,” as one user put it, or not asking deeper questions. Fans, on the other hand, seem to enjoy Sharpe’s laidback nature on the show, suggesting that it helps the guests open up more.
Sharpe responded to critics on his separate Nightcap podcast after his interview with Katt Williams brought him more negative attention than ever before. “I never said I was a journalist,” he said at the time. “I’m an entertainer. If you want hard-hitting questions, 60 Minutes is the platform for you. Dateline. 48 Hours. Go to Lester Holt.”
Now, with just over a week until Election Day, Kamala Harris is going to Shannon Sharpe.
