It all started with a tweet about a couch. Within hours of Donald Trump announcing the Ohio senator JD Vance as his running mate in the presidential race, a rather lurid accusation cropped up on social media.

The user of a since-deleted X account wrote last month, “can’t say for sure but he might be the first vp pick to have admitted in a ny times bestseller to fucking an inside-out latex glove shoved between two couch cushions (vance, hillbilly elegy, pp. 179-181).”

The fake page citation from Vance’s bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy lent credibility to what turned out to be a baseless claim, as detailed in a now-removed fact check from the Associated Press. Soon, the internet was awash in memes mocking Vance’s relationship with various pieces of furniture. “I did not have sectional relations,” one X user joked, paraphrasing Bill Clinton’s infamous quote about his extramarital affair. Another user added: “Who hasn’t been excited by the thrill of the chaise?”

Even Kamala Harris’s newly launched presidential campaign appeared to get in on the fun, tweeting: “JD Vance does not couch his hatred for women.”

  • expr@programming.dev
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    3 months ago

    Wait so the couch fucking thing was bullshit? It’s just so… specific. Talk about an impressive shitpost.

      • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        That is almost certainly why the AP fact check was taken down. While it was true that the alleged passage was not in the book as claimed, there is no proof that Vance did not fuck a piece of furniture.

      • warbond@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        We can only really say for sure that he didn’t write about it in his book. But have we checked everything he ever wrote?

    • pewter@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      It was always bs, but people on the Internet like spreading lies. I saw some politician go on MSNBC and she brought it up too. It’s embarrassing if she believed it and spread it.

      • EarthShipTechIntern@lemm.ee
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        3 months ago

        It’s only proper: Faux had been hyping ‘immigrant crime’ and every Trump positive, Biden negative bullshit they can. Spreading bullshit & lies? Republican marching orders. Pogram against Democracy. Putin smiles.

    • SeaJ@lemm.ee
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      3 months ago

      Yeah. Some random dude tweeted it and it got passed around. The original tweet was deleted because they realized it was getting taken seriously.

    • Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      The account posted the Arthur go in the Internet and tell lies meme like 10 minutes after, but the Internet had a meme, and the Internet wanted to keep that meme.