The ????? ???? ??????? ???????? ?? ???432678th Democratic presidential candidate debate in Los Angeles wound up on Thursday night with a final question from the moderators — something vague and vaguely festive about forgiveness and gifts.
However, when it was former vice president and current frontrunner Joe Biden's turn to answer, his anecdote about a young person with a stutter he met on the campaign trail got caught on a sound. "I-I-I-I-I-I can't talk," said Biden, as if quoting them.
While a few Twitter users initially thought Biden had attempted an ill-advised, ableist imitation of a person with a speech impediment, many more quickly shared a profile of Biden from The Atlantic, published in November. In it, he spoke at length about his lifelong struggle with a stutter of his own, which still seems to affect the fluency of his speech. (He's also spoken about it before, relating it back to the film The King's Speechin 2011, discussing it with NPR in 2008, and working with nonprofits focused on stuttering.)
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Oh hey, speaking of ill-advised, ableist imitations of a person with a speech impediment:
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Former White House press secretary and civility enthusiast Sarah Huckabee Sanders mocked the stutter in a now-deleted tweet, saying "I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I hhhave [sic] absolutely no idea what Biden is talking about" — and was promptly ratio'd to absolute heck for it. Before deletion, the tweet had just over a thousand RTs and nearly 15,000 replies, almost all furious.
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Sanders "clarified" her post in a second tweet, which was then also deleted within the hour: "To be clear was not trying to make fun of anyone with a speech impediment. Simply pointing out I can’t follow much of anything Biden is talking about."
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Biden, who got heated more than once during the debate, quote-tweeted the original insult, calling Sanders out with a bonus 'Think of the children': "I’ve worked my whole life to overcome a stutter. And it’s my great honor to mentor kids who have experienced the same. It’s called empathy. Look it up."
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Uncharacteristically, Sanders then backed off and apologised.
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While she may have been unaware of Biden's stutter, it's not the first time a former or current figure in the Trump administration has made fun of a disability.