As a White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre is supposed to make a living making news.
But in case of the woman casually referred to as “KJP,” it’s usually the wrong kind of news — whether she’s lying about a clearly befuddled boss in President Joe Biden or smearing former President Donald Trump with deliberate distortions.
And during a news conference Thursday, she committed the kind of unforced error that takes social media by storm — and showed just how bad she is at the job she’s supposed to be doing.
Like apparently forgetting what year the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks took place.
Wow. This is really bad. HOW is she still in this job?
— Sam Mitha (@MithaLaw) September 12, 2024
The moment came about midway through a news conference, when she was fielding a question about Trump’s association with right-wing bomb thrower Laura Loomer and Loomer’s comments in a Sunday social media post about Vice President Kamala Harris.
(Loomer had written that the White House will “smell like curry” and speeches will be “facilitated via a call center” if Harris wins in November.)
If it was a joke, it wasn’t close to funny (though the “call center” part had potential). But the question Thursday from CBS News’ Weijia Jiang was even worse — it was a softball that might as well have been planted in the press corps (if it wasn’t). It was an open invitation for Jean-Pierre to bash Trump and his supporters as racists and conspiracy theorists.
Should KJP be replaced?
Jean-Pierre then launched into her own mini-sermon that branched off on a social media post Loomer published last year that blamed the 2001 atrocity on then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. And that’s where KJP stepped in it — big time.
“Many of us have personal stories of that day — 9/11 of 2021,” she said.
She was 20 years off — and social media users exploded in mockery and scorn. Here’s a very small sample:
I remember 9/11/2021 like it was 3 years ago✊🏻
— Unfiltered Truth (@UnfiltdTruth) September 12, 2024
Let’s go with that. 9-11 also happened under Biden’s watch, apparently.
— Rachel Hartman (@RachelHart1911) September 12, 2024
She is an absolute disgrace.
— Rod Hastings (@Rod_Hastings) September 12, 2024
How does she have a job when she gets so much wrong
— josh adley (@josh_adley8725) September 12, 2024
Only a fool would think KJP seriously thinks 9/11 was in 2021. It was an obvious slip of the tongue — and one the press secretary didn’t repeat when she referred to the date again later in the news conference.
What is likely is that after two years as White House press secretary, she’s so used to parroting Democratic talking points about Trump — mindlessly, and endlessly — that her mouth forms words without any connection to actual thoughts in her brain. And for Democrats, trashing Trump about the Capitol incursion of Jan. 6, 2021, is as natural as breathing.
Shes so used to saying jan 6 2021.
— MAGA Jersey Girl (@Lainie19148) September 12, 2024
So it was a slip of the tongue, but it was more than that, too. It was actually an insight into how reflexive — and empty — the criticisms of Trump from the White House podium actually are. Jean-Pierre almost certainly doesn’t believe what she’s saying, anymore than the acolytes in the White House press corps believe her when she says it.
What matters to her — what matters to the establishment media — is that whatever is said ends up making Trump look bad.
But in this case, as she has so often before, Jean-Pierre simply ended up embarrassing herself — again.
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