Vice President Kamala Harris served up another helping of her trademark word salad in comments to mark Women’s History Month.
Harris, in her speech at the White House, said she, second gentleman Doug Emhoff, President Biden and first lady Jill were there to “honor the women who made history throughout history” — the latest astoundingly redundant claim she has made during her time in office.
“So, during Women’s History Month, we celebrate and we honor the women who made history throughout history, who saw what could be unburdened by what had been,” Harris said.
“We see the suffragists, the riveters, the marchers, the mothers and sisters and aunts and grandmothers and daughters, all the giants upon whose broad shoulders we stand,” she added.
Harris’ obvious remarks have earned her mockery across the political spectrum — and drawn comparisons to Selina Meyers, the often clueless vice president played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus in HBO’s satire “Veep.”
“Well, we are the United States of America because we are united… and we are states,” Meyers says at one point during the show.
Critics piled on Harris after her words from Wednesday’s event went viral.
“This reboot of Veep is kinda funny,” one Twitter user said.
“I’m convinced her speechwriter hates her,” tweeted Caroline Hakes, a digital media specialist for Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.
“They can’t even define what a woman is,” Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) also noted in response.
Harris has a history of repeating herself in public and trotting out her own tired phrases, frequently referring to her leadership approach as “what can be unburdened by what has been.”
The vice president first brought out the saying last year to tout the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act alongside Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
“That’s why we’re here today,” she said in March 2022. “Because we have the ability to see what can be unburdened by what has been and then to make the possible actually happen.”
Months later, Harris addressed the nation on the current mental health crisis among youth.
“You know, when we talk about our children — I know for this group, we all believe that when we talk about the children of the community, they are a children of the community,” she said in a speech at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C.
That was not the last time Harris talked of “community” problems.
“We invested an additional $12 billion into community banks, because we know community banks are in the community, and understand the needs and desires of that community as well as the talent and capacity of community,” she said during a roundtable discussion last September with students at Claflin University, one of more than 100 historically black colleges and universities in the US.
Harris has “worked” with words in front of international audiences, saying at a climate summit in May 2022 that the US “will work together and continue to work together to address these issues.”
“That is especially true when it comes to the climate crisis, which is why we will work together and continue to work together to address these issues, to tackle these challenges, and to work together as we continue to work, operating from the new norms, rules, and agreements that we will convene to work together on to galvanize global action,” she said at the conclusion of remarks given at the State Department before the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
The vice president has also delivered speeches on solemn occasions, as when she spoke to victims following a July 4, 2022, shooting in Highland Park, Ill.
“We’ve got to take this stuff seriously, as seriously as you are because you have been forced to take this seriously,” she said.
“The whole nation should understand and have a level of empathy to understand that this could happen anywhere [to] any people in any community. And we should stand together and speak out about why it’s got to stop.”
The vice president took the coronavirus pandemic “seriously” as well.
“It is time for us to do what we have been doing. And that time is every day,” she said during an interview on NBC News in January 2022. “Every day it is time for us to agree that there are things and tools that are available to us to slow this thing down.”
Harris’ way with words even extends to deeper reflections about the nature of time.
“The significance of the passage of time, right? The significance of the passage of time. So when you think about it, there is great significance to the passage of time,” she said during a stop in Sunset, La., to discuss bringing high-speed internet to communities.
But Harris sometimes spins her rhetorical wheels when speaking about simpler matters.
“Who doesn’t love a yellow school bus, right? Can you raise your hand if you love a yellow school bus?” she said at a Seattle event celebrating the Biden administration’s investment in electric vehicles.
“Many of us went to school on the yellow school bus, right? It’s part of our experience growing up. It’s part of a nostalgia, a memory of the excitement and joy of going to school to be with your favorite teacher, to be with your best friends and to learn. The school bus takes us there.”
She even has had time to share her appreciation for Venn diagrams, as she did during an event in January with Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm.
“I love Venn diagrams. I do. I love Venn diagrams. So, the three circles — and you can do more! Nobody says a Venn diagram has to only be three circles, right?” she said
