Vice President Joe Biden did not provide the best image for President Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign with his imitation of an Indian call center employee accent during a speech he gave in New Hampshire Thursday.
Mr. Biden was attempting to promote the president’s call for more manufacturing jobs in the U.S., versus American businesses moving them overseas.
The Obama administration wants to make the U.S. more appealing to businesses to open up more domestic manufacturing jobs, which lead Mr. Biden to make the following remark with a slight Indian accent.
“How many times you get the call, ‘I’d like to talk to you about your credit card’?” said the vice president. “Or that ad on TV, what is it? ‘Nancy, this is Nancy, can I talk to a supervisor?’ Right? OK? Well, it’s a little overdone, but the truth of the matter is these jobs now are paying about $19.50 an hour, if memory serves me.”
Mr. Biden switched back from the Indian call center employee accent in mid sentence though, almost as if he caught himself before it was too late.
However, perhaps it was too late. The Los Angeles Times reports that “Republican opposition researchers” circulated a YouTube clip of Mr. Biden’s Indian accent to reporters throughout the U.S.
New York Magazine published an article Friday suggesting that Mr. Biden was actually trying to use a Russian accent, because they claim his reference to “that ad on TV” was referring to a Discover Card commercial where a call center employee uses a Russian accent.
This would not be the vice president’s first time talking about Indian accents.
The conservative publication, The Weekly Standard, reports that in 2006 he made the following remark about Indian Americans in his home state of Deleware.
“In Delaware, the largest growth in population is Indian-Americans moving from India. You cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. I’m not joking,” said Mr. Biden.
Although he was talking about the expanding population of Indian Americans in Deleware, the suggestion that residents of Deleware would need a “slight Indian accent” to go to a 7-Eleven or Dunkin’ Donuts seems belittling, as it suggests that those are the only two occupations that Indian Americans have obtained in Deleware.
Furthermore, the vice president’s Indian call center employee accent on Thursday is sure to provide credibility for criticism from the Republican Party with the Obama administration facing a re-election year.
Although it is true a great number of American businesses outsource call center jobs to India, Mr. Biden’s Indian accent impression is sure to be viewed negatively by Indian Americans, especially with Republican presidential candidates already accusing Democrats of “class warfare.”
The vice president has not commented about his Indian accent usage since the New Hampshire speech Thursday.
