After years of condemning former President Donald Trump for spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories, Democrats are now mocking his running mate using a false, vulgar rumor.
The rumor, which was first published on X last month, includes a fake passage about sex and a sofa supposedly in Sen. JD Vance’s 2016 book “Hillbilly Elegy.”
The lie spread like wildfire, spawning jokes and memes, although the author of the original joke clarified that it was not true and later made his account private. Several news channels published fact checks on the claim.
The frenzy peaked in Philadelphia the day Vice President Kamala Harris nominated Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate. Walz told an arena filled with thousands of excited supporters, “I have to tell you, I can’t wait to talk [Vance]. That is, if – if he’s ready to get off the couch and show up.”
As the crowd roared and Harris grinned behind him, Walz, who just weeks earlier had started a trend of calling Republicans “weird,” joked, “See what I did there?”
The Harris campaign’s TikTok account, called Kamala HQ, posted a video of the moment, which has been viewed more than 5.3 million times.
As the pranks have become more common, Republicans have blamed Democrats for helping spread the joke — even as Trump and his allies continue to peddle lies about Harris and Walz.
Jonathan Turley, a conservative legal scholar, attacked X’s “couch story” because it had been “repeatedly debunked.”
“We’re not even post-convention and our leading candidates are already ‘rolling in the mud’ with trolls,” he wrote.
Democrats defend their jokes as harmless fun, pointing to harmful past conspiracies spread by Trump and other Republicans about Democrats being secret sex traffickers, pedophiles, or changing their identities for political purposes, which is far worse than a couch meme.
“For two years we had to hear that Joe Biden was an international super-criminal mastermind from Despicable Me 3. You’re going to hear a couch potato,” Rep. Jared Moskowitz tweeted last week in response to Turley’s complaints.
The content and rapid spread of a false rumor seems made for the age of social media, where the true, the false, and sometimes a combination of both, are presented and spread in equal measure—and when fact-checking often doesn’t have the same reach as bad information.
The case has also left rival political camps squabbling over which misinformation is worse than others and the blurred line between malicious or mere mockery.
Walz wasn’t the first to joke about a viral hoax. On July 27, nearly two weeks after the original false tweet was posted and a week after the author had hidden it, the Harris campaign account posted to X a screenshot of Vance’s 2021 tweet mocking “cat women.”
The post was titled “JD Vance doesn’t reveal his hatred of women”.
On July 26, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sent out a press release blasting Vance. The opening line read: “Today’s Republicans publicly praise Donald Trump’s vice presidential nominee with private criticism.”
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who at the time was considered to be on the short list for Harris’ running mate, leaned into the joke twice in the following days.
On the July 28 episode of ABC News’ “This Week,” Pritzker condemned Trump, saying, “He talks about all kinds of crazy things,” before adding, “You know, his running mate, as you’ve probably heard, is, you know, he became known for his obsession with couches .”
At the July 29 “White Dudes for Harris” Zoom fundraiser, Pritzker told attendees, “I’ll keep my remarks short. I know we’ll have a lot of speakers. And then of course there’s another Zoom, which I’m calling all of you, ‘Couches Against Trump.’
After Walz’s speech, some Democrats continued to embrace the joke.
Citing Vance’s tweet criticizing Harris for not answering questions from the media, Moskowitz told him, “I’ve been on Air Force 2 JD, it has a great couch.”
And at a rally in Las Vegas on Saturday, Rep. Dina Titus, who spoke before Walz and Harris, addressed Vance, saying, “You better hide behind that couch because we’re coming for you.”
Asked for comment about Titus’ comments, a spokesperson said, “I think we’re just going to go by what’s on the tape.”
As the outcry has grown, Republicans have blasted Democrats for spreading the lie — even as Trump and his allies continue to spread lies about Harris and Walz.
Democrats defend their jokes as harmless fun, pointing to harmful past conspiracies spread by Trump and other Republicans about Democrats being secret sex traffickers, pedophiles, or changing their identities for political purposes, which is far worse than a couch meme.
“For 2 years we had to hear that Joe Biden was an international super criminal mastermind from Despicable Me 3. You’re going to hear a couch potato story,” Moskowitz tweeted last week in response to Turley’s complaints.
Representatives for the Trump and Harris campaigns, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Pritzker and Moskowitz did not respond to requests for comment.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
