President Joe Biden surprised his second-in-command Kamala Harris with a bouquet of flowers and a gift for her birthday on Wednesday.
Vice President Harris, 57, was flattered by the gesture. “Really?” she said as the president walked into her office holding the bouquet, “Oh, I’m very touched,” she added as she leant in to kiss the president on the cheek, while they were both wearing black face masks. “Oh, look how gorgeous,” she said looking at the flowers.
President Biden then presented her with a framed photo of both of them laughing on the White House lawn. The pair posed for a picture during the gift-giving and VP Harris told President Biden: “I’m going to hang this up with great pride”.
The video of the flower-giving at the White House has already clocked up close to a million views since it was posted on the Twitter office POTUS account early on Thursday morning.
VP Harris also celebrated her birthday with White House staff, who shouted “surprise” when she walked into the room where a chocolate cake, balloons and more flowers were waiting for her. The room was filled with dozens of people who sang “happy birthday to madam vice president”, before erupting into a round of applause.
Ms Harris’s parents immigrated to America from Jamaica and India. Born in 1964 in Oakland, California, she was raised by biologist Shyamala Gopalan and Stanford professor Donald J. Harris. In 2020, Ms Harris became the first person of colour to be elected vice president of the United States.
Ms Harris was also the second African American woman to be elected to the senate in 2017, after Illinois’s Carol Moseley Braun, who served one term in the 1990s.
