When Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris announced Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate on Tuesday, something was not in her campaign’s reach: HarrisWalz.com. The domain, snapped up four years ago, was not acquired by either Harris or Walz but by Jeremy Green Eche, a prescient 36-year-old Brooklyn-based trademark attorney and domain investor.
Eche’s knack for predicting political pairings began as a mix of guesswork and a sharp sense for emerging political trends. His method involves a semi-annual “buying spree” on domain registration sites like GoDaddy and Name.com, where he secures domain names related to potential presidential tickets.
In August 2020, just months before the election that would put Biden in the White House, he preemptively acquired 15 domain names linked to Kamala Harris, including possible running mates like Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman, Washington Governor Jay Inslee, and, most importantly, Tim Walz.
Eche, a member of New York City’s Democratic Socialists of America chapter, attributes his success to a blend of political awareness and a background in autograph dealing during his college years.
“There’s probably like four or five other people doing it and I don’t know them,” he says of the domain-squatting community. “I just think it’s really fun to register a domain and then have this kind of payoff where I just hit the jackpot.”
His domain investments have sometimes paid off in a big way. In 2016, he owned ClintonKaine.com, which was used by the Trump campaign to publish anti-Clinton news. Originally hoping to get $10,000 from the Clinton staff for the domain, Eche sold it for $15,000 to an unidentified bidder who was subsequently found to be associated with Trump. “I’m hoping the people at the Harris campaign are maybe a little more savvy,” he remarked.
The Harris campaign was not actually interested in HarrisWalz.com. Instead, Eche sold the domain on Tuesday to “a seemingly random person with no connection to either campaign” for the asking price.
Eche’s domain investments extend beyond current politics. He has already acquired domains for potential future presidential candidates, including Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and various possible running mates. He is still investigating potential future candidacies, some of them including Walz himself.
“I should buy some before this story comes out.”
