Did a legitimate news report reveal the Kamala Harris presidential campaign was making an illegal $200,000 payment for travel expenses to music mogul Beyoncé for appearing at a campaign rally in 2024? No, that's not true: A satire site created that story to trick conservatives into sharing it as real. Campaign finance documents on file show no such payment to Beyoncé for travel expenses.The Federal Election Commission database shows the Harris campaign in November, 2024 paid production costs of $164,000 to a production company founded by Beyoncé, after the musician's Harris rally appearance.
The $200,000 travel expense claim appeared in an October 25, 2024 post (archived here) on The Dunning-Kruger Times website under the title "Beyonce's Rally Appearance Violates US Campaign Finance Laws". It opened:
According to our sources, The Harris Campaign is reimbursing Beyonce $200,000 for "travel expenses." The problem with that, aside from the insanely high price, is that the campaign also lists her private jet and accommodations on its expense report.
"There's no doubt in my mind," said Fritz, an unemployed meth addict from Louisville, "I've examined miles of data that appears on the horizon before me every time I ingest a little bit of rat poison. It all says the same thing."
Written by the fictitious "Flagg Eagleton," the fake news article becomes more obviously parodic and absurd as it goes on:
Fritz has little credibility among his peers, or...as a human being in general, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't all listen to the voices in his head and heed his warnings if they happen to coincide with our political beliefs.
After all, patriots, Fritz is a person, too. He has hopes and dreams and feelings. Just last week he was three bums away from being the next guy in a Joey Salads video, which surely would have skyrocketed him to the kind of fame on Dom of the Month can appreciate.
Screw Dave Portnoy, by the way. I like a pizza with a good punch of parm.
so there you have it, patriots. Whether the source is real or a junkie we invented to support a ridiculous claim, it's on the internet, and therefore true.
God bless America.
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.
Misinformation and the musician
Beyoncés support for Harris has generated other false claims.
In October, 2024, Lead Stories debunked the claim - for which no records can be found - that Harris paid the singer $10 million to appear at a campaign rally:
(Source: LeadStories.com screenshot by Lead Stories)
President Donald Trump posted a similar claim, also not linked to any sources, to his Truth Social account on May 19, 2025, saying Beyonce was paid $11 million to endorse Harris. That post by the president is archived here.
On May 19, 2025, Lead Stories updated the search for Federal Election Commission records of multi-million-dollar payments from the Harris campaign to Beyoncé.
Searching for Beyonce and her legal name, Beyonce Knowles, no payments were listed in Harris' campaign reports, but the one $164,000 payment to her production company is listed. The reports are shown below:
(Source: FEC.gov documents screenshot and rendered in graphic form by Lead Stories.)
Readers looking for other fact checks related to Beyonce will find here a debunked claim she was paid $10 million to endorse Harris and here a variety of other debunks about the globally famous entertainer.
