How Long Was The Fly On Mike Pence's Head?
After the much talked-about first presidential debate, nobody could have imagined that the vice presidential debate could possibly upstage the debacle that was called "a hot mess, inside a dumpster fire, inside a train wreck" by CNN's Jake Tapper. But here we are....
While the VP debate may not have had the onstage fireworks that Donald Trump and Joe Biden's debate had, it had something arguably better: a fly. That's right. A common housefly quickly became the star of the show when it landed on Vice President Mike Pence's head and sat there for what seemed like an eternity. Twitter quickly picked up on it, and suddenly that was all anyone could talk about.
Minutes went by as the fly sat on Mike Pence's head
Joe Biden quickly seized the opportunity to throw some shade Pence's way, while also garnering some donations. "Pitch in $5 to help this campaign fly," he tweeted during the debate along with a photo of him holding a fly swatter. He followed that up with a tweet pointing followers to flywillvote.com, which leads users to a voter registration page.
Horror novelist Stephen King got in on the action, too, tweeting, "THE LORD OF THE FLIES, starring Mike Pence! Coming soon to a streaming platform near you." The jokes were coming in so fast and furiously that "the fly" got its own Twitter account, complete with profile stating, "Pretty fly on a white guy."
But what everyone really wanted to know: Just how long did that fly sit on Mike Pence's head? Thankfully, The New York Times picked up the Twitter feed of a local reporter from California who had actually timed it: Two minutes and three seconds. 123 seconds. And those two minutes, for better or worse, seem to be the thing that this debate will be remembered for.