Alex Pearlman says he’s just a guy from Philly’s burbs. His viral TikToks have scored him invites to President Joe Biden and Gov. Josh Shapiro’s media events.

Alex Pearlman is quitting cigarettes. It’s his 17th day on the patch and he’s prefaced all his communications with disclaimers that he might be more heightened, or even weirder, than usual.

On his 13th day, he attended a news conference hosted by Gov. Josh Shapiro. By his 16th day? He was standing about 20 feet from President Joe Biden inside an airport hangar.

“It’s weird,” he told The Inquirer on Sunday. “I just want to state for the record, I’m just some f— guy. it’s been bizarre.”

Pearlman is best known online as @Pearlmania500 — a viral TikTok account with 1.7 million followers where he rants from his suburban Philadelphia home about everything from national trends to hyper-local affairs.

Pearlmania500′s digital profile has emerged for his ability to easily explain and summarize major events for a general audience. Locally, he joins other Philly-based content creators like Conrad Benner (a.k.a. @streetsdept) in explaining Philadelphia news, like “woodergate,” the wildfire smoke, and most recently, the I-95 bridge collapse.

A stand-up comedian for 20 years, Pearlman says he’s used to explaining big topics in a short amount of time. He’s also pretty well versed in politics. He became a Democratic committee person about a year ago as a write-in candidate because he wants a stop sign installed at the end of his block.

“When TikTok expanded to three-minute videos, that’s when the platform opened up for me,” he said. “In that three minutes, I can sit and talk to you. Just saying the I-95 bridge collapsed isn’t enough. This is a very important area — I know because I’ve taken this exit many times.”

He continued, “It’s where my in-laws live, Sweet Lucy’s barbecue is there — they catered my wedding, Four Seasons Landscaping is across the street.”

Still, Pearlman didn’t expect his I-95 explanation video — viewed nearly 2 million times — to capture the attention of the Governor’s Office. In fact, when he received their email, he thought it was a phishing scam.

“My wife and I did as much investigating as we could to verify these were actual real people in the Governor’s Office,” he said.

Wednesday afternoon as journalists covered Shapiro’s news conference from the bridge collapse site, Pearlman — seemingly the only nontraditional media member in attendance — walked around the area. In his TikTok, he shows the gaggle of reporters and videographers in a semicircle and then pans to the job site where construction workers were working on the rebuild.

“It caught me off-guard because I’m a very cynical person,” he said. “But they’re working 24/7. ... I have the footage of it.”

Pearlman posted some of that footage within two TikToks about the construction work, earning hundreds of thousands of views. He says he thinks the high interest in his videos is because of the authenticity that comes with his content.

“I posted the first video while the press conference was still going on,” he said. “Reporters all had the same camera angle. But meanwhile, I’m walking around in the background. They’re not filming it in the same way to show people.”

That strategy paid off. By Friday, Pearlman received another call from Shapiro’s team, this time asking if he wanted to attend Biden’s media event Saturday morning.

“I was at my day job and when I said ‘Sure, I would love to meet the president,’ you could hear a pin drop,” Pearlman recalled. “People were like ‘The president of what?’ and I’d say ‘of America.’”

This isn’t the first time politicians’ teams have worked with nontraditional media and content creators.

When Biden celebrated the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act last year, he invited more than 20 TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube influencers to attend the South Lawn event. He also hosted a call with about 30 TikTok creators for a briefing on the Ukrainian war.

“Every 10 to 20 years, there’s a change in communications,” Pearlman said. “News outlets aren’t as important to how people get their news anymore. ... So how do you get your message out? Sure, the governor has platforms, but someone has to know the name of the governor to access them. That’s part of where TikTok comes in.”

Locally, young organizers — and the candidates they’re backing — are also working to integrate new media into their communications strategies. When Shapiro was campaigning in November, groups like Students for Shapiro — founded by his college-age daughter Sophia — mobilized on Instagram and TikTok to connect with their base. Shapiro could even be found on BeReal, the social media app that has users post a photo taken simultaneously from their front- and back-facing cameras once a day.

» READ MORE: From TikToks to a 24/7 live stream, Gov. Josh Shapiro’s I-95 response grows his national profile

Now, as governor, Shapiro has a digital team that continues to work with local content creators.

Shapiro’s team hosted background calls with local influencers and experts to help combat misinformation when the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailed and when the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling on access to mifepristone.

But it’s not always tied to crisis. In March, Shapiro hosted a TikTok Live session with a Pittsburgh public schools teacher. On Earth Day, his office invited TikTok creators to the governor’s mansion to talk about agriculture, clean air, and clean water.

As for getting Pearlman involved, Shapiro’s press secretary Manuel Bonder said the governor’s digital team saw his initial TikTok the day of the I-95 crash.

“Alex is someone with a following and a really important voice on this,” he said. “Working with him was born out of a continuation of the desire to reach people where they’re at. This is someone with a following in the Philly community.”

Pearlman said he could see in real-time as members of Shapiro’s staff began to buy into his legitimacy.

“I think half of them expected me to do a dance in front of the collapsed bridge,” he said. “People still don’t fully understand what TikTok is.”

Still, Pearlman believes his invites are a sort-of case study for how political teams can disseminate information about major news.

Bonder agrees.

“This isn’t the first time, nor will it be the last time this administration takes this approach,” he said.

Pearlman arrived early Saturday — “I didn’t want to be late for the president,” he explained — and posted a TikTok about his experience. It was Day 16 of being a nonsmoker. He later turned the camera to Shapiro, asking him to tell viewers how it’ll take two weeks to reopen the damaged roadway portion.

“All I thought that day was, ‘Don’t make a yell-y TikTok while near the Secret Service,” he said. “No one knew who I was or why I was there and I loved it. I told the Secret Service guys I was with TikTok and they were like, ‘That’s banned on our phones,’ and I said, ‘I know, I made a TikTok about that.’”

Pearlman says he’ll continue to do news — and life — updates on TikTok. His time investment into the app has led to a headlining act at Helium Comedy Club later this year.

“I got that gig because of my TikTok comedy,” he said. “I’m not the news guy, I’m just some guy. Some days, I’m going to yell about Target not having plastic bags anymore because of a local ordinance.”

But as weird, chaotic, unpredictable life events keep getting thrown Pearlman’s way, he’s still just trying to quit smoking.

“Stressful things make people want to smoke,” he said. “If I can make it past the bridge collapsing, my house being covered in bees, tornado warnings — if I can get through all of these things without having to smoke, then yeah I can make it.”

“I met the president. I’m still not smoking.”