Did the NBA say to President Trump: Resign or we'll never play again? No, that's not true. The article is from the satire website bustatroll.org and is a completely made-up, fake story.
The story appeared in an article (archived here) where it was published by Bustatroll.org under the title "NBA To Trump: Resign Or We'll Never Play Again." It opened:
"The National Basketball Association recently suspended its season. At the time, the reason given seemed justified, given the emergence of COVID-19 and that several players in the league have now tested positive. However, it has been confirmed by anonymous sources that a league shutdown has been in the making for months and that they were simply looking for a good excuse to shut it all down."
The article opened discussing the fact that the NBA suspended its season because of coronavirus, which is true but then made up fake details about the league and Donald Trump. The fake story earned 57,000 shares on Facebook.
The article continued with details about Washington Generals player Art Tubolls. The Washington Generals are not in the NBA. The team plays against the Harlem Globetrotters in exhibition games and they have only won three games against them. Art Tubolls is not a real player and is an anagram for Busta Troll.
The photograph used in the article is a Getty stock image of James Harden, a player for the Houston Rockets, not the fictitious Art Tubolls. Besides his basketball career, Harden is known for dating reality star Khloe Kardashian.
From the made-up article:
The players, led by Washington Generals All-Star Power Forward Art Tubolls, held a secret vote prior to the beginning of the season to suspend the league for any credible reason until President Donald Trump resigns from office or is voted out. Since much of the league is made up of Hollywood actor and musician wannabes, these millionaire crybabies overwhelming voted to approve the measure.
Tubolls said:"Our league is the most popular league in the world and we have a lot of teams in the swing states. We know that we cannot directly pressure the President into resigning but if we can hold his approval rating hostage and make the people scream for his removal, that's what we'll do. Worst case is that we get him out in November. We have a plan for the rest of this season if we get our way and we have a schedule set to begin on January 21, 2021 if it comes down to it."
The liberal elite has been relentlessly attacking our country and our President.
First, LeBron James threatened the sit out unless our National Anthem is no longer being played before games and now this. Even the NHL and Major League Baseball have joined this futile effort. We all need to stand firm and show these overgrown millionaire toddlers that they need us more than we need them this November.
Here is a video of the real Washington Generals playing against the Harlem Globetrotters:
The bustatroll.org site is part of the "America's Last Line of Defense" network of satire websites run by self-professed liberal troll Christopher Blair from Maine along with a loose confederation of friends and allies. He runs several websites and Facebook pages with visible satire disclaimers everywhere. They mostly publish made-up stories with headlines specifically created to trigger Republicans, conservatives and evangelical Christians into angrily sharing or commenting on the story on Facebook without actually reading the full article, exposing them to mockery and ridicule by fans of the sites and pages.
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 omit the satire disclaimer and other hints the stories are fake. One of the most persistent networks of such sites is run by a man from Pakistan named Kashif Shahzad Khokhar (aka "DashiKashi") who has spammed hundreds of such stolen stories into conservative and right-wing Facebook pages in order to profit from the ad revenue.
When fact checkers point this out to the people liking and sharing these copycat stories some of them get mad at the fact checkers instead of directing their anger at the foreign spammers or the liberal satire writers. Others send a polite "thank you" note, which is much appreciated.
NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalist to rank the reliability of websites, describes bustatroll.org as:
One in a network of sites that publish false stories and hoaxes that are often mistaken for real news, 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.
