The Associated Press didn’t sit on social media rumours that Senator JD Vance (Republican, Ohio) had coitus with a sofa.
The wire service fact-checked the claim and declared in its headline on Wednesday, “No, JD Vance did not have sex with a couch.”
The oddly blunt head was screen-captured by Meidas Touch co-founder Ben Meiselas and others.
He did not have sexual relations with a couch according to the Associated Press. pic.twitter.com/4ZFCgvZUfl
— Ben Meiselas (@meiselasb) July 25, 2024
The wild assertions sprang from people on X (formerly Twitter) writing that Vance, now the running mate for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, wrote in his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, that he simulated the act with a rubber glove anchored between the cushions as a young man.
“You have only been a Senator for 18 months, you are NOT qualified to be @VP plus you depravely humped a couch and wrote about it in your book!” a Kamala Harris supporter wrote.
Even comedian Kathy Griffin chimed in, declaring the country should not have a “couchf*cker” as vice president.
At one point AP appeared to have another headline, “Posts spread baseless rumors about GOP vice presidential pick JD Vance having sex with a couch,” but the article has seemed to disappear. We’re checking with AP on that.
Why waste all that journalistic effort? According to Mediate, AP did a PDF search of the book that produced 10 references of “couch” or “couches” but in none of them did Vance take liberties. “Sofa” and “glove” did not appear anywhere in the memoir, AP wrote.
The Cut did its own investigation and reported that the pages allegedly recounting Vance’s alleged furniture tryst mentioned no such thing.
So there.
