Republicans may spend the fall questioning Joe Biden’s cognitive abilities, but Democrats will have plenty of Trump material on tape.
Trump apparently doesn’t know how to pronounce the name of one of America’s most famous national parks.
During a speech following after signing the bipartisan “Great American Outdoors Act” at the White House today, Trump twice pronounced Yosemite as “yo-Semite.”
“When young Americans experience the breathtaking beauty of the Grand Canyon, when their eyes widen in amazement as Old Faithful bursts into the sky, when they gaze upon Yosemites, Yosemites, towering sequoias, their love of country grows stronger and they know that every American has truly a duty to preserve this wonderous inheritance,” Trump said.
Yosemite is one of the country’s most visited tourist destinations — 4.5 million people traveled to the park in 2019, according to the National Park Service.
It, naturally, has prompted a lot of riffing on Twitter, with people making various version of the same “Yo, Semites!” and “Yo! -Semites” jokes.
The president can pronounce hydroxychloroquine, but not Yosemite.
— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) August 4, 2020
Happy Birthday Mr. President!
We miss your ability to pronounce words like Yosemite. pic.twitter.com/r3P43XbTY2
— BrooklynDad_Defiant! (@mmpadellan) August 4, 2020
Trump campaign would be selling “Yo, Semites” shirts by now if Biden said this https://t.co/UI22EkqlRy
— Will Steakin (@wsteaks) August 4, 2020
I remember learning the word “Yosemite” when I was like 5-years old – watching Yosemite Sam…pic.twitter.com/epKBIITua5
— Rex Chapman🏇🏼 (@RexChapman) August 4, 2020
It’s not the first time Trump’s pronunciation of locations in the United States has drawn scrutiny.
At a 2016 campaign rally, Trump made a big show of telling Nevada residents how to pronounce their state’s name.
“Heroin overdoses are surging and meth overdoses in Neh-VAH-da,” Trump said. “Neh-VAH-da… When I came out here, I said, nobody says it the other way. It has to be Neh-VAH-da, right?”
Locals overwhelmingly pronounce the name Neh-VAD-ah, but it’s commonly mispronounced by Americans in other parts of the country.
To this day, the president sometimes gets Nevada wrong.
On Monday at a White House press briefing, he said it both ways at different times.
Another one people have noticed lately: Oregon.
Trump says Ore-uh-GONE, when most Oregonians say ORE-uh-gin
There may not be an “official” way to pronounce many places — unlike in Arkansas, where the state’s general assembly declared AR-kan-saw to be the correct pronunciation in 1881 — but when a politician misses the mark on one of the country’s most famous national parks, Americans notice.