On Sunday, a photo of J.D. Vance purportedly dressed as a woman and wearing a blonde wig was posted to X (formerly Twitter). The unverified image quickly went viral and trended with the hashtag #SofaLoren, a false claim that the Republican senator had sex with a sofa, named after the famous Italian actress Sophia Loren.
A spokesperson for the Republican vice presidential nominee did not deny the photo’s authenticity when contacted by The Daily Beast, nor did they offer any further comment.
Travis Whitfill, the source who uncovered the alleged photo, said it was taken by a Yale classmate while Vance was attending law school there in 2012. Whitfill then sent it to podcast host Matt Bernstein, who posted it on X.
“This was from a group chat of Vance’s classmates, from a friend of a friend,” he told The Daily Beast. “It was taken from Facebook and I believe it was taken at a Halloween party.”
Whitfill also posted about his role in bringing the photo to light, sharing screenshots of the text conversation in which he first received the photo.
“I didn’t know him,” Whitfill wrote, “but from all sources I’ve heard, JD was actually a nice guy in law school. I don’t know what happened to him after that…”
“Doing my part for democracy 💁🏻♂️,” he added in another post.
Many commenters online connected Vance’s cross-dressing allegations to his legislative record, a long-standing concern for LGBTQ+ advocacy groups.
An Ohio senator has introduced the “Child Innocence Protection Act,” which aims to criminalize medical facilities that provide gender reassignment care to minors.
The Republican vice presidential nominee also supports measures to limit classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity, and has called critics of so-called “don’t say gay” bills “grooming.”
