KitchenAid posts insulting tweet about Obama's deceased grandmother

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KitchenAid quickly issued an apology last night after an offensive tweet about President Barack Obama’s deceased grandmother was sent out from its official Twitter page.

The tweet was sent during the first presidential debate last night, after Obama mentioned his grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, who died in November 2008, during one of his answers.

“You know, my grandmother — some of you know — helped to raise me. My grandparents did,” Obama said while discussing Social Security and Medicare policies. “My grandfather died a while back. My grandmother died three days before I was elected president.”

He then called his grandmother “fiercely independent” and said she was only able to be so because of Social Security and Medicare.

That is when the offensive, now deleted, tweet was posted on the KitchenAid profile page to its more than 25,000 followers.

The company deleted it promptly, but not before it was retweeted hundreds of times.

“During the debate tonight, a member of our Twitter team mistakenly posted an offensive tweet from the KitchenAid handle instead of a personal handle,” Cynthia Soledad, a representative for KitchenAid explained to Mashable. “The tasteless joke in no way represents our values at KitchenAid, and that person won’t be tweeting for us anymore.”

Apologies were also sent out from the KitchenAid account:

“I lead the KitchenAid brand, and I take responsibility for the whole team,” Soledad said. “I am deeply sorry to President Obama, his family, and the Twitter community for this careless error.”

Follow Ugonna on Twitter at @ugonnaokpalaoka.