A change in John Fetterman’s appearance, which has seen the Pennsylvania senator shave his trademark beard and grow a moustache, has sparked a wild conspiracy theory online that he may have been replaced with a double.
The claim has been made by a number of Donald Trump-supporting influencers, with one claiming it proves the American government “uses doubles.”
In November 2022, Fetterman was elected as a Democratic senator, defeating Trump-endorsed Republican Dr. Mehmet Oz in a tightly fought contest, which helped the Democrats maintain control of the upper chamber.
On Saturday Fetterman posted a photograph on X, formerly Twitter, showing he had removed his iconic goatee beard, and grown a spruce moustache. In reference to his 13-year-old son, he wrote: “Lost a bet with Karl” followed by the “disgusted face” emoji. The post was widely shared, receiving over 950 reposts and 1.9 million views.
Later the same day Gisele Barreto Fetterman, the senator’s wife, posted a photo of the couple with the caption: “Date night (ps. I never knew he had a chin.”
Asked what the bet had been about she replied: “Chess, always chess.”
However, online influencer Stew Peters took a different view. He shared the new photo of Fetterman, wearing a plain shirt and glasses, alongside an older one of him in a suit with his beard. He wrote: “The guy pretending to be John Fetterman looks nothing like the real John Fetterman. Ears clearly don’t match.”
Jack Danger, a self-styled “Twitter influencer” and part of the MAGA (Make America Great Again) movement, shared the same side-by-side comparison, commenting: “For those of you who still don’t believe the U.S. government uses ‘doubles’ despite all the evidence of Joe Biden & others, & for those of you who are on the fence, I give you actual evidence. They are trying to pass this person off as John Fetterman. Look at the ears.”
A third X account, with more than 34,000 followers, posted side-by-side shots of Fetterman along with President Biden, actor Jamie Foxx and philanthropist Melinda Gates. He wrote: “Just a few examples of how they are using doubles to fool the masses.”
Hi-Rez, a Trump-supporting rapper with 137,000 X followers, shared a video of a man claiming he had uploaded two photos to a “biometric scanning website,” from before and after he grew the moustache, showing only a 39 percent match. He added: “John Fetterman is a clone,” followed by a tears of joy emoji.]"
No other “evidence” has been presented to support the wild claims.
Gisele hit back at the conspiracy claims, commenting: “Thinking there may be something to the body double rumors … suddenly ‘John’ is closing kitchen cabinet doors. WHO IS HE,” alongside an eyes emoji.
When I was four years old, my dad shaved his mustache, and I swear to God I thought it was a stranger who came out of the bathroom and I ran away screaming.
I think that sums up the cognitive state of these particular conspiracists.
Lol. My dad shaved his beard when my sister was a toddler. She flew into hysterics. He hasn’t shaved his beard since. That was almost 40 years ago.
My dad changed his shirt because he got wet and I saw him walking outside with another shirt on without knowing about the first one. I thought he was a clone for half a day until he asked me what’s wrong. That was a good laugh for him.
I shaved my beard one time and my girlfriend dumped me. Some women apparently don’t get over that even into their 40’s.
(In her case it was because apparently I “looked too young” but the overall gist is the same.)
As a teenager I was at work and I was helping a customer. I had my very long hair down and a hoodie on, but it had been a cool spring morning and was starting to get pretty warm out. Finished my interaction, walked away, tied my hair up into a high ponytail and took off my hoodie. Ended up going back to talk to the customer later and he looked at me real carefully and said “do you have a sister?”
I shaved my beard when my daughter was a baby and I stuck my face in front of her. Her face looked all screwed up and confused for about 20 seconds, then she realized it was me and gave me a huge smile. It’s something I’ll never forget.
Did your dad work for govment?
Yoooo that comment from his wife Gisele though
“Gisele hit back at the conspiracy claims, commenting: “Thinking there may be something to the body double rumors … suddenly ‘John’ is closing kitchen cabinet doors. WHO IS HE,” alongside an eyes emoji.”
They seem extremely good at social media.
Of course: facial hair is the hardest part of the face to alter, so they gave up and hoped no one would notice.
I love this conspiracy, mostly because the ‘why’ factor.
Aside from sowing doubt in the world we live in, what’s the point?
I suspect these are the deeply mentally I’ll people who think there are actual lizard people.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but if I was looking for a double, I think choosing the same facial hair would be a no brainer, possibly the first thing to request.
That’s what they want you to think. They’re trying to outsmart you by making it obvious.
I’d also not immediately post a picture of the double on social media.
I haven’t looked into their reasoning at all but I would guess “the original” was incapacitated by his stroke so democrats put a clone in to take his place to keep the well liked politician in power.
Yes I also think this must be the actual reasoning.
You mean what’s the focal point? That’s what makes the difference. A professional camera lense verses a fucking phone camera. Damn these people are dumb.
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I’ve had a beard for a decade. I don’t understand how it would just go away. Clearly a beard disappearing could only be from a conspiracy theory
Since every accusation is a confession, I now expect Trump to send a body double to his booking on Thursday. But instead of an identical one, he’ll send one who is taller and thinner, because he thinks no one will notice (and it can make his reported height and weight better)
There was for sure a second Melania. They didn’t even look alike. The fake one was prettier.
I just googled it, and found a vox article where they portrayed thinking Melania used a body double as being equal to flat earthers.
I really hate this tendency to pretend all conspiracy theories are the same.
This one makes sense - they didn’t seem to have the happiest time together, the base wanted to see them together, this is an easy fix where everybody’s happy. She didn’t have a reason to be there and could have spent time with the kid instead, you could even argue it would be morally better.
I have no idea if they used a double - probably not - but it’s a perfectly reasonable thing to speculate in. It’s not crazy, it doesn’t require a huge cover up, and it would make sense.
If you can’t even speculate in this without being labelled as crazy, good luck ever uncovering anything that wasn’t meant to see the light of day.
I’ve read that article and agree. They make it out as if it’s a crazy conspiracy. I really think it’s pretty reasonable to think it happened. But either way I at least acknowledge it could be wrong.
And his legion of fans accept it’s him and get mad at anyone who says it isn’t.
has sparked a wild conspiracy theory online that he may have been replaced with a double.
The claim has been made by a number of Donald Trump-supporting influencers, with one claiming it proves the American government “uses doubles.”
[emphasis mine]
This is tripe, and there was no need to post it. The bold part is all I needed to see.
I find just about any political fanboi gullible as hell, but the magats are just on a different level when it comes to being suckers.
It’s fucking hilarious and I do not regret posting it.
I’ve voted for the dude every time he’s been on my ballot, since 2016. he’s got a sense of humor. He and his wife seem to be leaning in and making a joke of the situation.
Conservatives creating conspiracy theories? NO WAY!
I hold onto the conspiracy theory that the most bizarre Q conspiracy theories are the result of 4chan types seeing what they can get the radical fringe to actually believe, and just trying to outdo each other in monthly competitions.
That’s how it started. FBIAnon, CIAAnon, etc etc. For some stupid reason, stupid people took the Q one seriously. It’s one step removed from gangstalking.
As someone who had a Q clearance, it never made sense to me why they’d go with a person claiming to be DoE instead of CIA or DOD.
I guess the letter Q sounds cooler?
More original I guess. If someone online tells me they’re a CIA insider, my two remaining brain cells might accidentally collide and make me think something along the lines of “Huh. How do I know this person actually works for the CIA?”
However, if they say they’re Q, my thought process will probably stop somewhere around “Huh. This person is Q.”
Because why the hell would anyone lie about being Q? It doesn’t even mean anything.
Exactly. I have a mental image of a 4chan person thinking “I gotta be cooler than FBI and CIA! What about XAnon? No, too mainstream. I know, Q! Q sounds mysterious and cool!”
Maybe they were a star trek fan.
It’s from the government’s level of Q Clearance for getting to see classified material, which sounds very impressive and secretive, but it’s actually one of the lowest levels.
I’d say its political consultant groups using think tanks that employ teams of psychologist, sociologist and anthropologists among other PhD. All who sit around and come up with bullshit that the Koch brothers or whoever the latest asshole is that can use that research and figure out where to put their money and influence to be most effective. Like organizing a feminist protest to sell cigarette’s. Stuff that no normal person would see coming or figure out but a group of highly paid mentats figure out and the powerful people put into motion. Next thing you know Dan Bonginao is paying some country singer to produce songs about old ways that get blasted over this network that was built over 10 years on social media that looks grass roots but is just a straight up astro turfed funnel direct to the eye balls of the world
His stache looks great! I hope he keeps it.
I don’t know… he kind of has a high school teacher vibe to him with the mustache. He looked like an old alt rocker with the goatee.
This is a story about mental illness.
You’d think with all the meds floating around in this country at least SOME of the crazy would be toned-down just a notch…
And not John Fetterman’s. He got help and set an example for others.
I don’t want to start any wild rumors but Senator Fetterman is clearly a downed UAP pilot just trying to make his way in this crazy world.
“UAP“…Google yields no useful results…help me
It’s what they used to call UFOs. It stands for ‘unidentified aerial phenomenon.’
It may be just me , but if I were getting a body double, I think I would probably make sure he had the same facial hair, not something radically different.
If they were able to think critically, they wouldn’t be Trump supporters.
What a dumb thing to make a conspiracy theory about. Typical for the qanon right.
The real evidence that he’s not really Fetterman is that he’s wearing a suit and not a Pennsylvania tuxedo
