Republican vice presidential candidate and Ohio Senator JD Vance is being denounced for hypocrisy after a photo from his law school days surfaced on social media appearing to show him wearing a blonde wig and dress.
The photo first surfaced via X-user Matt Bernstein, who said the image was from Vance’s time at Yale Law School in 2012.
A short time later, Yale assistant professor Travis Whitfill stated that he was the source of the photo posted by Bernstein, but attributed the photo to another fellow student.
“It’s from a group chat of Vance’s classmates and it’s from a friend of a friend. I believe it was stolen from Facebook and taken at a Halloween party,” Whitfill told The Daily Beast.
The photo quickly went viral, and some social media users gave Vance the drag name “Sofa Loren,” a not-so-subtle reference to the “couch sex” meme based on a made-up story about the senator.
Whitfill wasn’t the only person with a 12-year-old photo from Vance’s caucuses. On Monday, someone sent Bernstein another picture of the future Republican senator and vice presidential candidate.
Vance’s campaign team did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment, but a spokesperson did not deny the existence of the photo to The Daily Beast.
Given Vance’s anti-LGBTQ+ comments and political stance, it’s no surprise that the images caused a stir on X, formerly Twitter.
To be clear, most people weren’t attacking Vance for wearing a dress, but for “demonizing others who wear drag,” as one commenter put it.
Don’t call JD Vance weird just because he wore women’s costumes.
Call him a hypocrite and a fanatic for demonizing others who wear women’s costumes.
— Melanie D’Arrigo (@DarrigoMelanie) 11 August 2024
Ladies and gentlemen, a picture of JD Vance in a women’s suit while studying at Yale Law School. ⬇️
I share this not to shame those who do drag, but to shame those who attack drag despite having once enjoyed the art form themselves. 👠 pic.twitter.com/6oIbmbprYL
— Judge Horn (@JusticeHorn_) 11 August 2024
WOW. Another photo of JD Vance in drag has been released. It’s absolutely fine for people, including JD Vance, to express themselves in this way! But it’s not OK for Republicans to do it and then attack people who do drag. pic.twitter.com/rHScekptg2
– Harry Sisson (@harryjsisson) 12 August 2024
There is nothing wrong with dressing as a woman. There is everything wrong with dressing as a woman and then taking the damn weird stance that drag performance and by extension LGBT people 🏳️⚧️ are deviants who deserve to have their rights restricted. You are a nutcase and a hypocrite, @JDVancehttps://t.co/VcSxhrENjd
— Christopher Nolan’s Oscar campaign manager (@Born4Bliss) 12 August 2024
The thing about JD Vance in a woman’s suit is that we gay millennials know exactly what kind of guy he is. We all had friends who were liberal in their twenties and when Trump came along, they drifted far to the right and blamed us for it.
Zoomers, watch out, your friends will too.— Nicky Frank (@NickyFrank30) 12 August 2024
I want to find out why Sofa Loren is trending because it’s JD Vance’s drag name.
I’m allowed to make fun of bad drag, I’m from San Francisco. I don’t make the rules. pic.twitter.com/MlCNbIPuhT
– Darren Mckeeman 🟥⬛️🟦⬜️🟦⬛️ (@tjcrowley) 12 August 2024
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