"OMG that was so cringe" — Internet reacts to Kamala Harris' prerecorded video for Al Smith featuring comedian Molly Shannon

U.S. Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris opted out of the Al Smith charity dinner on October 17, instead sending a pre-recorded message in her place. The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner is an annual bipartisan charity dinner that welcomes the two presidential nominees to share light-hearted roasts every election season.

While Republican candidate Donald Trump was in attendance, Kamala Harris' team played a pre-recorded comedy video of the VP with comedian Molly Shannon. Shannon reprised her SNL character, Mary Katherine Gallagher, a Catholic student.

"It is a very important dinner, and it's an important tradition that I'm so proud to be a part of," Kamala Harris said in the video.

The comedy sketch was met with mixed reviews on social media. While some praised Kamala Harris for the video, others were critical about it. One netizen on X tweeted:

"OMG that was so cringe."

Many agreed with the sentiment, adding that the sketch was not funny. Others claimed it was odd Kamala Harris wasn't at the dinner in person.

"I thought you said you were posting a comedy video?" one person questioned.

"This was cringe, disrespectful and hideous. Unfit," another person added.

"It’s bizarre she isn’t there in person. I guess Democrats are okay with a candidate who just dials it in," someone else commented.

"This is soooo embarrassing," another user wrote.

However, others commended Kamala Harris for the video, claiming she had great comedic timing.

"Kamala has Great comic timing. As evidenced by her masterful takedown of the heckler today," one person tweeted.

"Very strong applause for Kamala," someone else added.

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Kamala Harris reportedly skipped AI Smith dinner to continue her campaign trail

According to Fox News, Kamala Harris chose to skip the Al Smith charity dinner to continue her campaign trail. On October 17, the VP continued campaigning in Wisconsin with just over two weeks left for the election.

The Al Smith dinner invitations for presidential candidates became a tradition that was upheld since 1960 when presidential candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon spoke at the dinner. Since then, the charity dinner has become a place where the candidates share a stage one final time before election day.

In its nearly 80-year history, there have only been three occasions when the dinner did not invite the presidential nominees, during 1996, 2000, and 2004. Kamala Harris is the first Democratic nominee to forgo attending the dinner since 1984 when candidate Walter Mondale did not attend the event while his competitor, former president Ronald Reagan, gave a speech.

This year, marking the 79th Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, former president Donald Trump attended with his wife, Melania Trump. In his speech, Trump quipped about Harris not attending, saying:

"I must say I was shocked when I heard that Kamala was skipping the Al Smith dinner. I'd really hoped that you would come, because we can't get enough of hearing her beautiful laugh. She laughs like crazy."

President Joe Biden and Donald Trump both attended the Al Smith dinner in 2020. However, neither candidate roasted each other. This was a stark difference from the 2016 dinner with Trump and Hillary Clinton, where the audience reportedly heckled and booed the former for his pointed jabs against Clinton.

During his speech, Trump called Clinton "corrupt" several times and made several references to her leaked emails.

“I wasn’t really sure if Hillary was going to be here tonight because, I guess, you didn’t send her invitation by email. Or maybe you did, and she just found out about it through the wonder of WikiLeaks. We’ve learned so much from WikiLeaks. For example, Hillary believes that it is vital to deceive the people by having one public policy and a totally different policy in private,” he said.

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In other news, Kamala Harris was recently heckled during her campaign rally in Wisconsin on October 17. A group in the audience began shouting while Harris spoke about the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022.

However, Harris seemingly maintained her composure. She jokingly replied that the hecklers were at the wrong rally and that they needed to be in the smaller one down the street, which many interpreted as a jab at Trump.