Beto O'Rourke on Thursday Instagrammed live video of himself getting his teeth checked out at the dentist and people were not feeling it.
Dental tools jammed into his mouth, O'Rourke said into the camera: "So, I'm here at the dentist and we're going to continue our series on the people of the border. I'm here with Diana, my dental hygienist."
"Diana's going to tell us a little bit about growing up in El Paso," O'Rourke said in the video, the camera pointed toward his dental hygienist. Diana then shared stories about her father and mother, who worked to get citizenship with the help of their neighbors.
O'Rourke has often used Instagram to share moments from his life and broadcast conversations. But many folks online were not please with the latest installment from the dentist.
Video from @BetoORourke: “So, I’m here at the dentist...” pic.twitter.com/QNWNLJGF3Y
— Philip Crowther (@PhilipinDC) January 10, 2019
"This has jumped the shark," tweeted CNN's Kyle Blaine. Buzzfeed political reporter Ruby Cramer simply posted, "noooooo. Added the Atlantic's Olivia Paschal: "Stop putting the Beto dentist picture on my timeline, there is nothing i want to see less than i want to see Beto getting his teeth cleaned."
In general, the basic sentiment from folks was that maybe sharing a teeth cleaning wasn't very fun for the viewer.
Can everyone please stop retweeting the Beto dentist photo?
— Mary Ellen McIntire (@MelMcIntire) January 10, 2019
I'm not saying that @BetoORourke's intentional efforts to pre-normalize ahead of a likely campaign, setting himself up to teflon against likely Trump caricaturization attacks, is not a valid use of journalism time.
— Derek Wallbank (@dwallbank) January 10, 2019
I am saying STOP RETWEETING A DUDE'S DENTISTRY INTO MY TIMELINE https://t.co/tsTr7WKRrv
Despite losing his Senate bid in 2018 and this latest ill-advised stream from the dentist's office, O'Rourke is considered a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. The former congressman has not disappeared from public view after the midterms, but has backed away a bit while 2020 speculation has mounted.
For instance, this week on Instagram, he offered a response to Trump's Oval Office speech.
"The president using fear and anecdote to try to instill an anxiety and paranoia to build the political will to construct this wall that would cost $30 billion and take private property and cause death and suffering as more asylum seekers are pushed to ever more hostile stretches of the U.S.-Mexico border—that was what we heard from the Oval Office," O'Rourke said, via Politico. "And we need to meet that fear with the truth, with our ambition, with the best traditions of this country, a country of immigrants, and with the example of El Paso and Juárez."
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