Fake Trump Supporter Scams Conservatives Out Of $150,000 On GoFundMe After Being “Disowned”? By Brian Feldman in a left-leaning magazine.
There are few things the MAGA crowd loves more than a black Republican. The meteoric rise of Candace Owens and the embrace of Kanye West, despite his Hollywood A-list status, are symptomatic of a group desperate to prove it isn’t racist.
Over the past few months, the conservative sections of social media have become fixated on the #WalkAway campaign, urging Democrats and minorities to take off their blinders and join the Republican party. Late last month, it seemed that the Republican party had added a black college student named Quran to its ranks. …
The tweet went viral, and she got a momentary blast of internet fame, but then things went awry. Quran’s parents disowned her, kicked her out of the house, and refused to pay her college tuition.
To make ends meet, Quran set up a GoFundMe, asking for financial support from her newfound Republican fanbase. …
And then the tables turned. Less than three hours after claiming to have been disowned by her family, Quran revealed that the text messages and the MAGA hat were a ruse to scam desperate, insecure Republicans.
The applause started rolling in. Everyone loves a good scam and she seemed to be scamming the right people. Screenshots of her tweets went viral on Twitter as other users aggregated the narrative. … A rumor started circulating that she’d raised more than $150,000. …
Asked for a ballpark figure, she quickly admitted she hadn’t scammed anyone. “That’s the thing though: I didn’t,” she confessed. “I just felt really weird about taking their money. This could go south really fast, I just decided to refund everyone and give their money back. I think it was like maybe $200 at that point.” …
So, who got scammed in this situation? A few Republicans got scammed out of money, and thousands more got exposed as overeager to accept new black members to the party in order to prove they’re not racist. Did the Trump Train get scammed? Yes.
Still, Quran didn’t actually raise the tens of thousands of dollars that people want to believe she did. It’s a great viral story with all the touchstones — trolling, deceit, racists getting exposed, someone getting rich — but it’s not true. Are people who are quick to fall for viral hoaxes getting scammed? Yes.
Perhaps she lied to reporter Brian Feldman about how much money she received? Anyway, an interesting story of the political times.
