Did Jon Stewart broadcast a livestream about the Virginia Giuffre case and did the show get 3.2 billion views globally? No, that's not true: Giuffre was one of the women who accused Jeffrey Epstein and others of sexual abuse as a teenager. There is no evidence such a show was ever broadcast. The website and Facebook pages spreading the claim are part of a spam network based in Vietnam that uses AI tools to target Americans and Europeans with fake clickbait. We call it Viet Spam.
The claim originated in a series of posts on Facebook pages, include this post (archived here) published by the Afternoon Daily page on February 20, 2026. The caption opened:
WHEN TELEVISION IS GAGGED, JON STEWART CHOOSES TO BROADCAST THE TRUTH FROM HIS OWN HOME -- JUST HOURS AFTER THE LIVESTREAM, THE VIDEO EXPOSING THE DARK SIDE OF POWER EXPLODED TO 3.2 BILLION VIEWS WORLDWIDE.
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Sat Feb 21 18:48:44 2026 UTC)
This is what the image used in post looked like at the time of writing:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of Facebook)
The caption continued:
No brightly lit studio. No censorship, no pre-approved script. Just a private room, a microphone, and a voice refusing to stay silent. In that live broadcast, Jon Stewart did not avoid powerful names, nor did he gloss over details buried for years. He peeled back each layer of files, every connection, every suspicious silence surrounding the case of Virginia Giuffre -- a case that once shook the highest levels of the elite.
What kept billions watching was not only the allegations, but the way power structures operated to protect one another. Who knew? Who stayed silent? And why did the truth truly erupt only when it was spoken from a private room, instead of on national television?
It was no longer just a livestream. It was the moment the wall of silence began to crack
There is no documentation that such a broadcast by Stewart about Giuffre ever occurred. A Google search (archived here) for the terms "Jon stewart livestream giuffre" returned only examples of the false claim and another example of a similar false claim previously debunked by Lead Stories. A Facebook search (archived here) for the phrase "When television is gagged, jon stewart chooses" revealed other examples of the same false claim on Facebook pages controlled by the Vietnamese operation.
The Afternoon Daily Facebook page (archived here) is managed from Vietnam, according to Meta's transparency data:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of Facebook)
The post links to an article (archived here) that expands on the fake story. The website hosts a constant stream of AI-generated false stories promoted on hundreds of Facebook pages managed from Vietnam.
Here is how you can tell from where a suspicious Facebook page is controlled. Click on the page name at the top of the profile page. A second box will appear showing the countries where the managers are located.
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of Facebook)
The Vietnam connection is significant, since fact-checkers, including Lead Stories, have identified a major source of AI-generated false stories coming from a single operation based in that Southeast Asian country. You can see recent reporting and fact checks mentioning that country here.
Lead Stories has published a primer -- or a prebunk -- on how to identify these kinds of fake posts exported from Vietnam. It's titled "Prebunk: Beware Of Fake Fan Pages Spreading False Stories About Your Favorite Celebrities -- How To Spot 'Viet Spam'"
