I'm With Her
I'm With Her
[Inset: Eleven characters are drawn around a huge H with a rightwards arrow as the horizontal bar connecting the two vertical towers.  Ponytail stands on the left with a raygun looking leftwards. Behind her is Black Hat who looks at a girl that might be Danish or Megan (but with longer hair than Megan typically has). She is flying a kite above the first two characters. Behind her and looking up at the kite is White Hat. The H is right behind him, and on top of the left tower sits Blondie looking straight out at the reader with her legs dangling over the edge and her arms resting on her knees. On the arrow sits Megan leaning against the left tower, also dangling her legs over the edge and arms resting on her knees. Cueball stands to her right by the right tower. On top of the right tower sits Hairbun with glasses looking straight right with her legs dangling over the edge one arm resting on a knee and leaning back on the other arm. On the right side of the H is an adult version of Science Girl holding a hand out towards the squirrel which Beret Guy is holding out in both arms towards her. Another Cueball stands on an office chair on the right brandishing a sword looking rightwards. He keeps his balance by holding his other arm out behind him. Caption] I'm with her.
[Centred] How to help Vote―iwillvote.com Get a ride to the polls―drive2vote.org If you're having problems voting―866-OUR-VOTE Experimental social turnout project―civicinnovation.com App Store: VoteWithMe Reminder: If you're in line when the polls close, they have to let you vote.

In this serious, no joke , comic released the day before the 2016 United States presidential election (which was more contentious than most, due in part to many people finding both candidates unusually distasteful), Randall urged his American viewership to vote, and showed his endorsement for Hillary Clinton , the Democratic nominee in the election. She was up against the Republican nominee Donald Trump , who ended up winning. For the sake of completeness, it should be mentioned that there were also nominees from other parties, including Green Party nominee Jill Stein , and Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson . Neither hoped to garner enough votes to become president, but there was a chance they could affect the result in some states (no third-party candidate has won a state since 1968 , and it did not occur this time either: the closest any came in 2016 was independent candidate Evan McMullin in Utah.)
It was the second time Randall referred to this election, the first being 1748: Future Archaeology three weeks before the election, but here it was just a wish to know the result using time travel (of course he did not learn the result back then…).
The "H" with an arrow was Clinton's campaign logo, and I'm with her an official slogan that was widely used by her supporters, hence the title. Randall then lists tips to help you cast your vote ( see table below ) suggesting a personal investment in the election. Clinton herself may be represented by Blondie sitting on top of the H looking out at the reader as the only of the 11 characters. The only type of joke in the comic is the chosen characters. Two with weapons flank the left and right side looking out ready to defend against Trump: Ponytail with an emp gun (that she also wielded in 322: Pix Plz for melting computers of persons who make snide remarks at women, clearly a reference to allegations of Donald Trump's sexual harassment of women in general and especially to his grab them by the pussy comment ) and Cueball with his sword (from 303: Compiling ). See more details in the character gallery below.
This is the first time Randall has used a comic to directly support a presidential campaign, although he did endorse Barack Obama in 2008 on his Blag . At that time, Randall wrote that he was troubled by Hillary Clinton's "basic lack of integrity", which is interesting considering he later endorsed her. He wrote later that it was very controversial when he endorsed Obama, but that it was not the most controversial comic he had published at that time. This comic might take that prize now, given that this was one of the most discussed elections up to its time.  This is particularly noteworthy outside the US—for example, some European leaders openly opposed Trump, while others supported him. There were also reports of Russian hackers attempting to influence the election.
Randall's support for Hillary Clinton may have been due in part to Donald Trump being a prominent climate change denier . Randall has published comics opposing climate change denial such as this: 1732: Earth Temperature Timeline , published less than two months before the election, as well as several other comics on climate change . Also Trump beating Clinton made Randall's regex that matches the last names of elected US presidents but not their opponents impossible to update.
All the information on the bottom half of the comic includes sites, numbers, info, etc., current as of 2016, that are intended to help US voters to vote, regardless of whom they vote for. Including this information can assist voters who don't understand the process, don't feel that it's worth it, or feel intimidated or threatened.  In general, these sites and numbers were likely included to help boost voter turnout.
The title text, "We can do this", refers to Randall's desire to unite Democratic voters and elect Hillary Clinton to the White House instead of Trump.  One can buy T-shirts with the famed " We Can Do It! " logo from the Rosie the Riveter wartime poster, but with Hillary Clinton in the famed position.  Both resemble the former president Barack Obama 's campaign slogan Yes We Can and German Chancellor Angela Merkel 's " Wir schaffen das " (We can do this) refrain during the Syrian War refugees influx the year earlier—like Clinton, Merkel was fighting against a populist nativist movement that wanted to close the country's borders.
Unfortunately for Randall, these efforts were in vain, as Donald Trump was elected on Tuesday, November 8. This result became a fact less than two weeks before the first ( 1761: Blame ) of several sad comics that all seemed related to the election of Donald Trump. Trump was never mentioned in these directly sad comics, and it took more than two years before his full name was finally used in xkcd in 2137: Text Entry in April 2019. Here it was remarked that the fact that Donald Trump was president was the weirdest thing of 2019.
The list of things that can help is all about getting people to vote.  While Randall is likely to have wanted to boost voter turnout regardless of political leanings, it's clear from his endorsement of Clinton that he believed increased turnout would have helped her win the race.  There is general evidence that certain more heavily Democratic-leaning demographics are less likely to vote, and in this election in particular, the various political issues that had been raised against Hillary (such as the FBI's public disclosures of its investigation into her use of a private email server) were shown to have reduced enthusiasm among Democrats.  But all these issues aside, both Republicans and Democrats alike agree on encouraging everyone to vote, and Randall is likely to have agreed with that sentiment as well.
Here is Randall's list of suggestions for how to help Hillary Clinton win the election:
The comic shows a gallery of 11 xkcd characters including all the main characters from xkcd (except Hairy ), which stand united behind Randall and Clinton despite their lack of agreement in many other comics.
Note that the two characters at either side of the comic wield weapons pointing out, defending the other nine. Those next to the characters with weapons are doing recreational things like kiting and admiring adorable squirrels, both of which are recurring subjects in xkcd.
[Inset: Eleven characters are drawn around a huge H with a rightwards arrow as the horizontal bar connecting the two vertical towers.  Ponytail stands on the left with a raygun looking leftwards. Behind her is Black Hat who looks at a girl that might be Danish or Megan (but with longer hair than Megan typically has). She is flying a kite above the first two characters. Behind her and looking up at the kite is White Hat. The H is right behind him, and on top of the left tower sits Blondie looking straight out at the reader with her legs dangling over the edge and her arms resting on her knees. On the arrow sits Megan leaning against the left tower, also dangling her legs over the edge and arms resting on her knees. Cueball stands to her right by the right tower. On top of the right tower sits Hairbun with glasses looking straight right with her legs dangling over the edge one arm resting on a knee and leaning back on the other arm. On the right side of the H is an adult version of Science Girl holding a hand out towards the squirrel which Beret Guy is holding out in both arms towards her. Another Cueball stands on an office chair on the right brandishing a sword looking rightwards. He keeps his balance by holding his other arm out behind him. Caption] I'm with her.
[Centred] How to help Vote―iwillvote.com Get a ride to the polls―drive2vote.org If you're having problems voting―866-OUR-VOTE Experimental social turnout project―civicinnovation.com App Store: VoteWithMe Reminder: If you're in line when the polls close, they have to let you vote.
