Did The Simpsons predict the future again? An episode from 2000 shows Lisa wearing outfit similar to Kamala Harris'
The episode even makes a reference to Donald Trump being a former president of the United States.
A future version of Lisa Simpson in the episode Bart To The Future which was released in 2000 and US Vice President Kamala Harris during her inauguration in 2021. (Photos: Disney, AP/Saul Loeb)
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The Simpsons has done it again. A 2000 episode of the long-running animated sitcom is gaining renewed attention for its parallels with the latest political situation in the US.
Bart To The Future, which aired on Mar 19, 2000, centres around the character Bart Simpson who gets a glimpse into the year 2030 where he becomes a down-on-his-luck musician while his sister Lisa becomes "the first straight female president".
Viewers have since commented on the similarities between Future Lisa and US Vice President Kamala Harris. In the episode, Lisa mentions that she "inherited quite a budget crunch from President Trump" and is seen wearing a pantsuit similar to the one worn by Harris during her inauguration in 2021 – down to the pearl necklace.
Even The Simpsons showrunner Al Jean has hopped onto the conspiracy bandwagon. On Monday (Jul 22), he posted a collage of Future Lisa and Harris with the caption: "The Simpsons 'prediction' I’m proud to be a part of."
This isn't the first time that The Simpsons has been credited with predicting the future. The same episode previously received a surge in popularity in 2015 following the official launch of Donald Trump's presidential campaign.
In the 2010 episode Elementary School Musical, the character Milhouse Van Houten bets that Finnish economist Bengt R Holmstrom would win the Nobel Prize in Economics – a feat the latter would eventually achieve in 2016.
Even actor Tom Hanks has been part of the prophecy. In 2007, the Forrest Gump star made a memorable cameo as himself in The Simpsons Movie where he stars in a public service announcement, saying: "The US government has lost its credibility, so it's borrowing some of mine."
Years later, in 2022, Hanks would appear in a pro-Joe Biden ad where he said that he has "never been more optimistic about America’s future".
In an interview with British pop culture publication NME, Al Jean addressed the coincidence and said: "One of our writers, the guy whose episode predicted Donald Trump as president, said it best: 'If you write 700 episodes, and you don’t predict anything, then you’re pretty bad. If you throw enough darts, you’re going to get some bullseyes.'"
