Whitmer apologizes after Catholics say Doritos video mocked Communion

The eight-second video opens with author and influencer Liz Plank gazing up as a disembodied hand places a Doritos chip on her extended tongue, causing her eyes to roll back in apparent pleasure. The shot then pans left to reveal Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) holding a bag of chips, wearing a camouflage Harris-Walz presidential campaign hat and staring deadpan into the camera.

What Whitmer said was meant to be a riff on a social media trend has turned into a headache. Whitmer has apologized for the video after a Catholic organization accused her of mocking the sacred rite of Communion.

On Friday, the Michigan Catholic Conference, the church’s lobbying arm in the state, published a statement to “express profound disappointment and offense taken at the actions in the video.”

“It is not just distasteful or ‘strange;’ it is an all-too-familiar example of an elected official mocking religious persons and their practices,” conference President and CEO Paul Long wrote.

In a statement, Whitmer said she didn’t mean to reference Communion in the video but nevertheless apologized for the miscommunication.

“Over 25 years in public service, I would never do something to denigrate someone’s faith,” she said. “I’ve used my platform to stand up for people’s right to hold and practice their personal religious beliefs.”

Whitmer said the video was meant to be about the importance of the Chips and Science Act, which passed into law in 2022 to provide $52 billion to companies building computer chip factories and research facilities in the United States. The caption for the video, which was edited Friday, reads, “Chips aren’t just delicious, the CHIPS Act is a game changer for U.S. tech and manufacturing, boosting domestic production of semiconductors to reduce reliance on foreign suppliers! Donald Trump would put that at risk.”

“What was supposed to be a video about the importance of the CHIPS Act to Michigan jobs, has been construed as something it was never intended to be, and I apologize for that,” Whitmer said in her statement.

Regardless of Whitmer’s intent, the video “had an offensive impact,” Long said.

The video riffs off a social media trend in which someone out of view suggestively feeds the on-camera subject only for the shot to pan, revealing not a romantic interest but a friend or elderly relative who often looks disgusted. The videos are often set to Nelly’s 2002 song “Dilemma.” Late-night host Stephen Colbert and actor Jeremy Allen White hopped on at the height of the trend in June by releasing their pizza-related version.

That’s no excuse, Long said.

“The skit goes further than the viral online trend that inspired it, specifically imitating the posture and gestures of Catholics receiving the Holy Eucharist, in which we believe that Jesus Christ is truly present,” Long said.

Stacey LaRouche, a Whitmer spokeswoman, said Plank was not kneeling in the video but sitting on a couch.

In a Substack post titled “In Defense of my Demon Allegations,” Plank on Saturday said she chose to promote her new show “Chip Chat” and her Whitmer interview with what she called the “Feeding a Friend” challenge “because it felt fitting, given that we were eating together.”

“It is a non-controversial trend on social media that has been used by some of the biggest names and celebrities to build engagement and promote things like ‘Chip Chat,’” she said in a statement to The Post.

But, she added in her Substack post, critics turned something lighthearted into “an elaborate and utterly bizarre narrative,” and within minutes, she’d become the target of “a right-wing conspiracy accusing me of performing satanic rituals with Doritos.”

The same day she published the promotional video, Plank posted a 9½-minute one to YouTube in which she interviews Whitmer for her “Chip Chat” series. During the conversation, Whitmer talks about her stance on abortion, connecting with male voters, the prospect of meeting one of her would-be kidnappers and, yes, her favorite chips: Better Made, which are produced in Detroit.

The Michigan Catholic Conference has criticized Whitmer’s policies in the past, largely the ones concerning abortion rights, education funding and transgender issues.

Whitmer was elected Michigan’s governor in 2018 and vaulted into the national spotlight four years later with a double-digit reelection win while ushering in Democratic control of both chambers of the state legislatures for the first time in 40 years. Her name was bandied about to replace President Joe Biden on the Democratic presidential ticket after his disastrous debate performance in June and again as Vice President Kamala Harris’s running mate when she became the presumptive nominee.

Ashley Parker and Jeanne Whalen contributed to this report.