The White House has been mocked online after it posted a lengthy tribute to Harambe, a gorilla fatally shot at the Cincinnati Zoo 10 years ago during an attempt to save a three-year-old boy who fell into the gorilla habitat.
Harambe became a viral internet meme after he was killed by a zoo worker on May 28, 2016. The boy apparently climbed over the outer barrier before falling some 15ft into a shallow moat. A special response team shot and killed the 17-year-old western lowland gorilla to protect the boy.
Harambe did not return inside after zoo officials signalled for him to do so and, instead, went to investigate the child, who had fallen into a moat. The gorilla dragged the child from the moat onto dry land, but was eventually shot and killed. The zoo described the action as necessary “in order to save the life of a child”
In a post on X, the White House said: “Rest easy to a true patriot.”
The post, which was shared late on Wednesday night, added: “Tomorrow marks 10 years since we lost him.”
“He became a symbol of loyalty, strength, chaos, unity, and the strange beauty of the internet bringing millions of people together for one cause: never forgetting Harambe,” the post read. “Everyone remembers where they were when they heard the news.”
Harambe quickly became an internet meme after his death, amid an internet backlash to his killing.
Social media websites were flooded with tributes to him, with a “Justice for Harambe” petition eventually being launched.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris’s Gen-Z-focused X account, Headquarters, took a swipe at the White House over the post.
The account shared an image of a man in an orange t-shirt branded with a Reddit logo, which it captioned, “How the admin felt posting this.”
Reddit, an online social media platform, is a popular site for sharing internet memes. Another account posted, “Reddit occupied government.”
“Glad to see the White House is laser-focused on the key issues of the day,” one user quipped.
At the time of the shooting, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump said that zoo employees “probably had no choice.”
The gorilla was named as “2016’s meme of the year” by Vox. In July 2016, Public Policy Polling reported that more respondents support for the late gorilla for president was greater than support for the Green Party’s Jill Stein.
