Did Kamala Harris say one of the ways to reduce greenhouse emissions in the United States was to “reduce population”?
Claim In a recent speech on the 14th July 2023 Vice President Kamala Harris said the following to a large audience who then applauded it: “Think about the impact on something …
Claim
In a recent speech on the 14th July 2023 Vice President Kamala Harris said the following to a large audience who then applauded it:
“Think about the impact on something like public health. When we invest in clean energy and electric vehicles and reduce population, more of our children can breathe clean air and drink clean water.”
Lead Stories: False
Lead Stories say:
No, that’s not true: While she did say the words “reduce population,” a While House official confirmed to Lead Stories that the intended word was “pollution,” and a correction made in the White House transcript reflects that.
It appears to be an unintended mistake. A White House official told Lead Stories over the phone on July 17, 2023:
I can confirm that the vice president intended to say pollution.
Our Rating – True
Justification
It is evidently true that Kamala Harris spoke the quoted words, they were spoken without awareness that a mistake had been made and there was no remorse shown for saying such a grievous thing, not even a flinch or any body language cue to give away that these words were not intended.
The sentence flowed correctly and made perfect sense, what she said is correct as by reducing the number of people it would make the environment better, but is of course a hideous thing to say and no correction was offered by Kamala afterwards.
This video shows the exact sentence in question:
Here it is in close up:
and here is a longer version giving more context:
Could this have been scripted?
If it was scripted then Kamala would have exhibited the calm and composed delivery we see in the recording. However these words are unlikely to have made it onto a teleprompter, unless it was a prank!
If it was not scripted then, these words may also have been rehearsed by Kamala before delivering the speech, and again this would offer the cool presentation that we have witnessed. But what would drive her to say this knowing that it would be televised to the world?
Was it a mistake then?
Lead Stories and the US White House both claim that these words were misspoken and accidental, but is this likely?
The White house released a correction to the speech on the 16th July 2023 as follows:
Lead Stories also got a quote from an unnamed White House correspondent saying that the words were not intentional, and that she had intended to say pollution instead of population.
They also state that the official transcript had been corrected to say pollution, but this is no longer an official transcript faithfully reporting what was said, at least in my view!
Is it realistic that the word population an easy slip of the tongue from the word pollution?
If as it is claimed, there was a slip of the tongue and population became pollution with no obvious sign that a mistake had been made, is it likely that one can slip from one word to the other?
Well a more obvious misspeak would be to something like “solution” or “ablution” “volution” or maybe “revolution”. For the misspoken word to be population it must have been on her mind at the time, like with the Huw Edwards slip on BBC news the other week which was shared widely on TikTok:
So with this kind of slip up being the most likely scenario, why would Kamala have population reduction on the mind?
Well one only need be on the internet for 5 minutes these days and some story involving population reduction will come round, whether the source is being reported as the WEF, or Bill Gates, Yuval Harari, or some other prominent “leader”, the topic is on everyone’s lips and is perhaps why it was on her mind.
However to not realise what had been said, and to be applauded for it immediately afterwards is very strange indeed. A quiet silence from the audience would have been appropriate but instead they clapped away and cheered like these were the words they wanted to hear!
Perhaps if the audience had reacted differently then Kamala would have realised that she had said something horrid to the wrong crowd?
Conclusion
So it can be evidentially shown that Kamala Harris said the reported words, and that the White house has confirmed it. The words were beyond inappropriate and one wonders what meeting she had been in, or what phone call she had had before giving the speech?
This was not in anyway a normal slip up and for authorities and fact checkers to try to cover it up as unintended is wrong. No one can claim to know what was intended except for Kamala and we have heard nothing from her, no written speech has been presented as evidence so we are left to believe that Kamala was speaking from the heart.
Also it is morally corrupt to change a transcript of the speech; effectively retcon’ing the words as if they were never spoken.
I would suggest that people’s opinions of the Vice President of the USA have not been positively effected by this vile spectacle.