A false rumor that GOP VP candidate JP Vance once had sex with a couch has sent internet meme makers into overdrive.
Memes began circulating on social media on Wednesday mocking the Ohio senator, 39, after it was wrongly claimed that he wrote about having sex with the multi-person seat in his best-selling book Hillbilly Elegy.
The false information reportedly began circulating on X after the now-private account @rickrudescalves wrote: ‘Can’t say for sure but he might be the first VP pick to have admitted in a NY Times bestseller to f***ing an inside-out latex glove shoved between two couch cushions.’
The X account then provided a fake reference for the unfounded claim as pages 179 to 181 of Vance’s 2016 memoir.
The internet has been abuzz with memes inspired by a false rumor that claimed republican candidate for vice-president JD Vance once confessed to having sex with a couch
It did not take long for the unfounded claim to spread like wildfire, with many using the opportunity to get creative with memes.
One meme shows the Simpsons around their broken coach with the caption: ‘… and that is why we won’t ask JD Vance to housesit ever again.’
One X user shared an edited version of the Hillbilly Elegy cover, with the alternative title, ‘Pushin Cushion.’
The fake cover adds: ‘A memoir of a love that fit the creases.’
Meanwhile standup comedian Elon Altman wrote: ‘The JD Vance story was obviously fake. Only a lazy boy would believe that nonsense.’
Many other social media users have joked that Vance is now banned from The Sofa Store.
High-profile names such as comedienne Kathy Griffin appeared to fall for the fake news, writing: ‘I don’t think we should have a couchf***er as our vice president. That’s just me. Sorry JD.’
The false information was being so widely shared that the Associated Press published a now-deleted fact-check titled, ‘No, JD Vance did not have sex with a couch.’
However, by the next day, the AP had removed the article from its archives, with the page address showing it is now unavailable.
A spokesperson for the AP told DailyMail.com on Thursday that the fact-check on Vance did not go through the standard editing process.
The agency said it’s looking into how it was published.
Vance’s bestseller about his roots in rural Kentucky and blue-collar Ohio made him a national celebrity soon after its publication in the summer of 2016, and became a cultural talking point after Trump’s stunning victory that November.
Netflix paid Imagine $45 million for the exclusive screening rights in January 2019. The movie, starring Glenn Close and Amy Adams, debuted on the streaming platform in November 2020.
After the announcement that Vance would be on the ticket with Trump for November’s showdown election with President Joe Biden, the movie became the third most streamed movie on Netflix.
Moreover, a spokesperson for HarperCollins told The Associated Press that more than 650,000 copies of Hillbilly Elegy have been sold since Trump’s announcement on July 15. The total includes physical books, audio books and e-books.
‘We are printing hundreds of thousands of copies to fill the demand at our retail partners,’ the publisher announced Thursday.
