Did a "MAGA fan" from Iowa accidentally burn down their house while trying to burn a gay pride flag? No, that's not true: This is a fictional story that originated on "The Halfway Post," a satire website with a clear disclaimer included in the masthead. The claim is spreading as a screenshot of a social media post that does not show the disclaimer.
The claim surfaced in a post on Threads (archived here) where it was published by @lakota_man on June 11, 2024. It was captioned:
Stupid, homophobic and homeless is no way to go through life.
(Image source: Threads screenshot taken on Mon Jun 17 15:48:53 2024 UTC)
This Threads post (pictured above) is a screenshot of a June 11, 2024, post on X by @HalfwayPost which reads:
The Halfway Post
@HalfwayPost
BREAKING: A MAGA fan in lowa accidentally burned down his house today trying to burn a gay pride flag.
The post on X predates an article (pictured below), which appeared on halfwaypost.com (archived here) on June 14, 2024. The article titled, "A MAGA Fan In Iowa Burned Down His House Trying To Burn A Gay Pride Flag," had no details about the purported incident and went further to say that he also, "set his truck on fire trying to burn a DVD of Brokeback Mountain."
(Image source: halfwaypost.com screenshot taken on Mon Jun 17 16:57:38 2024 UTC)
The article was formatted like a newsletter summary of noteworthy events, except each of the brief 21 bullet points was tongue-in-cheek satire. The website's about section says this about creator Dash MacIntyre:
Dash MacIntyre is a comedian, satirist, and poet from St. Louis. He created The Halfway Post in 2017 to publish halfway real Dada news and satire, and wrote enough about Donald Trump to publish his first book Satire In The Trump Years: The Best Of The Halfway Post available at Barnes & Noble and Amazon. He is currently compiling a forthcoming Satire In The Biden Years.
Lead Stories did a search using keywords "A MAGA Fan In Iowa Burned Down His House" on Google, visible here, which found no credible documents or reporting to corroborate the claim. Other fact check agencies have also reviewed this claim, including Newsweek, Reuters, and Politifact.
Additional Lead Stories fact checks on claims originating from The Halfway Post can be found here.
