White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre suffered a social media embarrassment on Tuesday when a post seemingly intended for President Joe Biden’s account on X, formerly known as Twitter, was accidentally published on her own.
“Investing in America means investing in ALL of America. When I ran for President, I made a promise that I would leave no part of the country behind,” Ms Jean-Pierre unexpectedly declared to the world mid-afternoon.
The post was swiftly deleted soon after.
She made no further comment explaining the gaffe and instead returned to posting about Mr Biden’s visit to Wisconsin earlier in the day and his intention to fly to Hawaii to survey the devastation wrought by the deadly wildfires on the Big Island and Maui over the last week.
But – despite her silence and the post’s swift deletion – several social media users picked up on the apparent blunder.
Fox News contributor Joe Concha responded: “Welp. I guess we know who’s been writing President Biden’s tweets for him. (A) Karine Jean-Pierre (not good)… (B) White House intern (also not good)… (C) The person who left cocaine at the White House (*really* not good).”
“I mean it’s not like anyone thought he ran his own twitter,” chimed in another person.
Others simply posted memes and gifs including one which read “whoopsies”.
While Ms Jean-Pierre’s error did appear to reveal Mr Biden doesn’t write his own social media posts, for many that may prove reassuring given Donald Trump’s rampant use of Twitter during his own presidency – when policy would be announced and Cabinet secretaries fired at all hours of the day or night, often seemingly on a whim online.
Meanwhile, the online blip comes as Mr Biden’s press secretary was attacked by Republicans earlier this week for apparently mispronouncing the names of Hawaii Senator Mazie Hirono and the state’s Governor Brian Schatz, whom she appeared to call “Senator Shorts” during a daily briefing.
The situation on the ground in Hawaii meanwhile remains extremely difficult.
The death toll has risen to 106, with as many as 1,000 people still missing and emergency responders struggling to identify the dead.
The historic town of Lahaina has been largely destroyed by the blaze and many more homes and buildings wrecked.
President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden have announced plans to visit Hawaii on Monday to meet with first responders, survivors and officials.
