Republican vice presidential candidate and Ohio Sen. JD Vance is getting dragged for hypocrisy after a photo from his law school days surfaced on social media, appearing to show him in a blonde wig and dress.
The photo first came to light via X user Matt Bernstein, who said the pic dates back to Vance’s days at Yale Law School in 2012.
A short time later, Yale assistant professor Travis Whitfill said he was the source of the photo that Bernstein had posted, but credited another classmate for taking it.
“It’s from a group chat of Vance’s fellow classmates and is from a friend of a friend. I believe it was grabbed from Facebook and was taken at a Halloween party,” Whitfill told The Daily Beast.
The photo quickly went viral, with some social media users giving Vance the drag name “Sofa Loren,” a not-exactly-subtle reference to the “couch sex” meme that is based on a fake story about the senator.
Whitfill wasn’t the only person with a 12-year-old photo from Vance’s party days. On Monday, somebody sent a different pic to Bernstein of the future Republican senator and vice presidential nominee.
Vance’s campaign did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment, but a spokesperson did not deny the photo’s existence to the Daily Beast.
Considering Vance’s anti-LGBTQ+ comments and policy stances, it’s no surprise the pics caused a kerfluffle 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.