Did Nany Pelosi send a letter to Iran saying that "Trump will be out by next year"? No, that's not true: The story was published by a liberal satire website that tries to educate gullible Trump supporters and Republicans about the need to actually click and read links before sharing or liking them in order to avoid being embarrassed by fans of the site later. All the events described in the article are not real.
The story originated from an article published by the satire site BustaTroll on June 23, 2019 titled "Pelosi Letter to Iran: 'Trump Will Be Out By Next Year.'" (archived here) which opened:
In a move that some critics are calling the "very height of disrespect", House Speaker Nancy Pelosi penned a letter Friday to President of Iran Achmahadajed Mahmalukah regarding President Trump's attitudes towards recent tense events, and made assurances that he would be : "out by next year."
Users on social media only saw this title, description and thumbnail:
Pelosi Letter to Iran: 'Trump Will Be Out By Next Year.'
In a move that some critics are calling the "very height of disrespect", House Speaker Nancy Pelosi penned a letter Friday to President of Iran Achmahadajed Mahmalukah regarding Preside...
This satire piece continued:
The letter, two pages long, and written on Hello Kitty stationary was delivered this morning by bicycle messenger to One.Tehran Palace, where His Supreme Mufta had it read to him by a servant as he smoked his breakfast hooka pipe and reviewed progress reports from Dearborn, Michigan. Moles within the palace say the Iranian President was pleased with Pelosi's letter, and immediately had it placed on his refrigerator door.
You may see a version of this story that Lead Stories marked as "false" and not "satire." That is because other sites steal the satire copy and republish it without the satire label. It is not unusual for social media users to then share it, thinking it is real.
The BustaTroll site is part of the "America's Last Line of Defense" network of satire websites run byself-professed liberal troll Christopher Blair from Maine and his partner in crime John Prager along with a loose confederation of friends and allies. Blair has been in a feud with fact checking website Snopes for some time now and has also criticized other fact checkers in the past who labeled his work "fake news" instead of satire. In reaction to this he has recently rebranded all his active websites and Facebook pages so they carry extremely visible disclaimers everywhere.
Every site in the network has an about page that reads (in part):
About Satire
Before you complain and decide satire is synonymous with "comedy":sat·ire
ˈsaˌtī(ə)r
noun
The use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.Everything on this website is fiction. It is not a lie and it is not fake news because it is not real. If you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined. Any similarities between this site's pure fantasy and actual people, places, and events are purely coincidental and all images should be considered altered and satirical. See above if you're still having an issue with that satire thing.
Articles from Blair's sites frequently get copied by "real" fake news sites who often omit the satire disclaimer and any other hints the stories are fake. Blair has tried to get these sites shut down in the past but new ones keep cropping up.
Blair and his operation were profiled by the Washington Post on November 17, 2018 by Eli Saslow:
'Nothing on this page is real': How lies become truth in online America
November 17 The only light in the house came from the glow of three computer monitors, and Christopher Blair, 46, sat down at a keyboard and started to type. His wife had left for work and his children were on their way to school, but waiting online was his other community, an unreality where nothing was exactly as it seemed.
If you are interested in learning more about Blair and the history of his sites, here is something to get you started:
The Ultimate Christopher Blair and America's Last Line of Defense Reading List | Lead Stories
STORY UPDATED: check for updates below. Yesterday Eli Saslow at the Washington Post wrote a fantastic article about Christopher Blair, a man from Maine who has been trolling conservatives and Trump supporters online for years and occasionally even made a living out of it.
If you see one of his stories on a site that does not contain a satire disclaimer, assume it is fake news. If you do see the satire disclaimer it is of course also fake news.
NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalist to rank the reliability of websites, describes bustatroll.org as:
A site that publishes false stories and hoaxes that are often mistaken for real news, part of a network named America's Last Line of Defense run by hoax perpetrator Christopher Blair.
According to NewsGuard the site does not maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability. Read their full assessment here.
We wrote about bustatroll.org before, here are our most recent articles that mention the site:
- Fake News: Malia Obama Did NOT Cash $1.2 million 'Tax Refund' Check
- Fake News: 14 State Attorney Generals Did NOT Step Forward Demanding Indictments Against Clinton and Obama
- Fake News: Ihlan Omar Did NOT Commit Treason and Nancy Pelosi Did NOT Cover It Up
- Fake News: Ilhan Omar Did NOT Propose Tax on Pork Products 'So Costly Nobody Will Buy Them Anymore'
- Fake News: Trump Did NOT Revoke Pelosi's White House Pass
