Harris met with disability advocates to discuss the impact of Roe v. Wade being overturned, on Tuesday, the 32nd anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The vice president began the meeting by mentioning her pronouns and providing a physical description of herself. Others at the meeting also introduced themselves with pronouns and a description, likely for the benefit of those with impaired vision.
“I want to welcome these leaders for coming in to have this very important discussion about some of the most pressing issues of our time,” Harris said at the beginning of the meeting. “I am Kamala Harris, my pronouns are ‘she’ and ‘her.’ I am a woman sitting at the table wearing a blue suit.”
Boebert took exception to the vice president using pronouns and referring to herself as a woman during the introduction, arguing that including such information was “idiotic” on Twitter.
“Kamala Harris just introduced herself with she/her pronouns at an official event,” Boebert tweeted. “She then clarified that she was a ‘woman’ sitting at the table wearing a blue suit. This is what happens when your speechwriter quits and you hang around with Geriatric Joe too long.”
“When you use pronouns to introduce yourself, I’m assuming everything you have to say after is as idiotic as your introduction,” she added in a subsequent tweet.
Harris’ use of pronouns and a physical description was also shared without context by the RNC Research Twitter account, which is run by the Republican National Committee with a self-described mission of “exposing the lies, hypocrisy, and failed far-left policies of Joe Biden and the Democrat Party.”
Boebert was not the only prominent Republican to mock Harris for her introduction and physical description. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas tweeted, “But what is a woman?”
Others lashed out at the Republicans, suggesting that they were being insensitive toward those with disabilities by mocking an introduction meant to be inclusive.
“@VP @KamalaHarris has been at the forefront of including the disability community in the @WhiteHouse’s process,” tweeted Matthew Cortland, a disability rights lawyer and senior fellow at Data for Progress. “What the @VP did today is best practice for disability inclusion – the @RNCResearch mocking her for it? Tells us a great deal about the jackasses at the RNC.”
“On #ADA32 seems like a good time to remind folks that if you want an event to be accessible to visually impaired/blind people what Vice President Kamala Harris is modeling here is how it should be done,” Democratic strategist Atima Omara tweeted.
During the meeting, the vice president argued that abortion rights being eliminated or limited in many states due to Roe being overturned would have a disproportionately negative impact on those with disabilities.
“We know that all people with disabilities, of course, in the United States should have full access to reproductive care and the reproductive care they need,” Harris said. “But these abortion restrictions that are being put in place around our country by extremist so-called leaders in various states will have a disproportionate impact on people with disabilities.”
Newsweek has reached out to Harris’ office and the White House for comment.