Pardon her French.
Vice President Kamala Harris has been mocked online for appearing to mimic the accent of her host country during a charm offensive aimed at shoring up relations with America’s oldest ally.
Harris affected what many described as a French accent while on a visit to a COVID-19 lab at the Pasteur Institute in Paris on Tuesday, Fox News reported.
“One of the things people in politics and government should really take from the approach of scientists — scientists operate with a hypothesis. I love that,” the veep said.
“A hypothesis. It’s well-thought-out, it’s well-planned, they start out with a hypothesis and then they test it out knowing invariably, you’re trying something for the first time, there will be glitches, there will be mistakes,” she continued.
“Then everyone gets together, no one gets beat up about it, you analyze it — what went wrong, re-evaluate, update the hypothesis and start again,” Harris added before mocking how pols always stick to “The Plan.”
At that point, she seemed to switch to a French accent while using the phase.
“In government, we campaign with ‘The Plan,’” she said. “Uppercase T, uppercase P, ‘The Plan’! And then the environment is such we’re expected to defend ‘The Plan’ even when the first time we roll it out there may be some glitches and it’s time to re-evaluate and then do it again.”
Her linguistic lilt didn’t go unnoticed in social media.
“Is she using a FRENCH ACCENT?! I love this episode of Veep,” Abigail Marone, press secretary for Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), said on Twitter.
“There really are no words anymore… #AuRevoir,” political columnist Joe Concha captioned a post from political action committee America Rising that included a clip of Harris addressing French scientists.
“I thought we canceled pepe lepew,” Washington Examiner commentator Becket Adams quipped, referring to the French striped skunk animated character Pepé Le Pew.
Harris’ trip comes as Washington’s relationship with Paris hit a historic low this year after a US-British submarine deal with Australia scuttled a French contract to sell subs to the Australian navy.
Late last month, President Biden told French President Emmanuel Macron the US had been “clumsy” in its handling of the issue.
