Was the story about about Rosie O'Donnell's application for residency in Ireland being denied by the Irish Department of Justice real news? No, that's not true: No, that's not true: The story originated on a website with a clear satire disclaimer. It is run by a man known for tricking conservatives into liking and sharing made up content.
The story appeared in an article (archived here) published on "The Dunning-Kruger Times" on March 16, 2025 titled "Ireland Denies Rosie O'Donnell's Application for Residency" which opened:
In a surprising decision, the Irish Department of Justice has denied actress and comedian Rosie O'Donnell's application for residency, citing unspecified concerns related to her eligibility. O'Donnell, who has long expressed admiration for her Irish heritage and the country's cultural history, had reportedly sought to establish a permanent home in Ireland as part of a personal and artistic retreat.
Lead Stories used the Hive AI Detector browser extension to analyze the sample of the text of the story, and the tool said it was "91.8 percent likely to be AI-Generated," as shown in the screenshot below:
(Image: Hive browser extension results obtained by Lead Stories on March 16, 2025 at 19:03:09 UTC)
The Dunning-Kruger Times
The Dunning-Kruger Times is a satirical website with an about page (archived here) that has following disclaimer:
About Us
Dunning-Kruger-Times.com is a subsidiary of the 'America's Last Line of Defense' network of parody, satire, and tomfoolery, or as Snopes called it before they lost their war on satire: Junk News
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.
The website is named after the Dunning-Kruger effect, a term from a psychology experiment that describes the phenomenon of being ignorant of one's own ignorance. (That experiment has been disputed by a math professor.)
It is run by self-described liberal troll Christopher Blair from Maine who for years has run networks of websites set up to troll conservatives with made-up news items in order to get them to share his posts. He often goes by the nickname "Busta Troll." A 2018 BBC profile called Blair "the Godfather of fake news," describing him as "one of the world's most prolific writers of disinformation."
His websites usually have multiple satire disclaimers and the stories very often contain obvious hints they are not real, like category names indicating they are fiction, links to "sources" that instead go to funny or offensive images or an "S for Satire" logo added to the images used as illustration. Another telltale sign is the name "Art Tubolls" (anagram for "Busta Troll") for characters in the stories. Blair also frequently pays homage to two of his friends who passed away by using their names ("Joe Barron" and "Sandy Batt") in stories.
Blair's stories have been widely copied by spammy, foreign website networks trying to make a buck by spamming American conservatives with clickbait headlines.
Here you can find some of the many, many stories from Blair's websites Lead Stories debunked over the years.
