Hillary Clinton, Bill de Blasio criticized over racially tinged joke

Hillary Clinton and Bill de Blasio are facing criticism after a joke during a press event that some are calling racist.

The joke unfolded at New York City's annual Inner Circle Show, a charity event hosted by local media that often includes lampooning of local politicians, particularly the mayor. (It was the event that, in 2000, was responsible for the skit that featured then-mayor Rudy Giuliani in drag sharing a moment with Donald Trump.) 

Delivered by de Blasio, the joke occurred during what was supposed to be a hilarious exchange between Clinton and de Blasio with Clinton thanking de Blasio, who helmed Hillary's 2000 U.S. Senate run and worked for then-president Bill Clinton, for his recent endorsement. The pair were joined on stage by Leslie Odom Jr., currently earning raves for his portrayal of Aaron Burr in the musical Hamilton. 

The exchange went like so: 

Clinton: "I just have to say thanks for the endorsement, Bill. Took you long enough."

de Blasio: “Sorry, Hillary, I was running on C.P. time."

Odom: “I don’t like jokes like that, Bill."

Clinton: "Cautious politician time."

Watch the exchange below.

What's caused the uproar is that "C.P. time" means "colored people time," which, as Newsweek explains, is "the stereotype that black people are always running late." 

Listen closely and you can even hear the audience let out an uncomfortable "ooooh" underneath a few awkward chuckles. 

"Let's be clear, in an evening of satire, the only person this was meant to mock was the Mayor himself, period," a mayoral spokesperson told Mashable via email. "Certainly no one intended to offend anyone."

Appearing on CNN on Monday night, de Blasio added, "It was a scripted show, and the whole idea was to do the counterintuitive and say cautious political time."

The cringe-inducing moment comes as the Democratic race for the party's nomination has taken a harsher tone, and days after former president Bill Clinton got into a confrontation with Black Lives Matter protesters over his 1994 crime bill and Hillary's use of the phrase "super predator" to describe gang members in the wake of the bill. (Earlier this year, Clinton apologized for having used the term.)

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So, reaction on the Internet has been, as one would expect, not kind to the pair. 

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New York's Rembert Browne (who gave us a terrific Hamilton-inspired photo of the moment) got the best line in when he says of de Blasio, whose wife is African-American, "The comedy isn’t in the joke — it’s in watching someone stumble so hard." 

He also nails it when he says, "This is the worst election ever."

Mashable has also reached out to the Clinton campaign for comment. 

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