Did Thai golfer Atthaya "Jeeno" Thitikul say 'don't touch my family' at a news conference with White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt? No, that's not true: No media outlets reported that about the golfer or any other celebrity, including actors Robert De Niro and Tom Hanks and gospel singer Guy Penrod, who was rumored to have made the identical statement to TV host Whoopi Goldberg. The claim was an example of so-called "Vietspam" campaigns of nearly identical made-up clickbait stories, each featuring a different famous person, created to drive traffic to web pages based overseas, often in Vietnam.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published on Facebook on December 4, 2025. It opened:
'DON'T TOUCH MY FAMILY OR MY COUNTRY.'Jeeno Thitikul SHOCKS the entire press room after Karoline Leavitt's INSANE disrespect! What should've been a routine press conference EXPLODED when Leavitt dropped a vile remark at Thitikul and her family. Without blinking, Jeeno Thitikul seized the mic and unleashed 14 words that STOPPED everyone cold, freezing the sports world. Leavitt scrambled with a cringe apology begging for 'peace,' but Thitikul's 14 fierce words sent social media into meltdown, screaming pride, loyalty, and unshakable love for her family and country.
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of post at facebook.com/people/Golf-Masters)
Despite this supposed confrontation occurring in a room full of journalists, no media outlets reported that, as seen on Google News (archived here) and Yahoo News (archived here).
Such posts started to populate social media in September 2025 (archived here). They followed the same template, but the name of the celebrity supposedly attending a White House press conference and the number of words that person allegedly said to Leavitt varied. In February 2026, the rumor resurfaced on the internet one more time (archived here):
(Source: Lead Stories recording of search results page on facebook.com)
Lead Stories found posts attributing the "Don't touch my family" phrase said in similar circumstances to at least 76 people:
- Robert De Niro
- Piero Barone
- Lauren Daigle
- Bette Midler
- Lewis Capaldi
- Guy Penrod
- Itzhak Perlman
- Tom Hanks
- Islam Makhachev
- Jessica Pegula
- David Draiman
- Shedeur Sanders
- Tommy Fleetwood
- Austin Reaves
- Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
- Céline Dion
- Alexandra Eala
- Rhonda Vincent
- Jackson Browne
- Josh Allen
- Fernando Mendoza
- Shane Filan
- Michael Jordan
- Irad Ortiz Jr.
- Tiger Woods
- Usain Bolt
- Jordan Chiles
- Checo Pérez
- Jacob Rodriguez
- Lincoln Riley
- Hunter Henry
- Rory McIlroy
- Manny Pacquiao
- Drake Maye
- Vince Gill
- Andrea Bocelli
- Gretchen Walsh
- Lia Thomas
- Novak Djokovic
- Lewis Hamilton
- Darci Lynne
- Jannik Sinner
- Coco Gauff
- LeBron James
- Dan Campbell
- Oisin Murphy
- Marcus Freeman
- Alex de Minaur
- Dak Prescott
- Carlos Santana
- Nelly Korda
- Jaxon Smith-Njigba
- Adam Lambert
- Kendall Coyne Schofield
- Kyle Larson
- DJ Moore
- Gaël Monfils
- Morgan Wallen
- Paddy Pimblett
- Kelly Clarkson
- Letsile Tebogo
- Aryna Sabalenka
- Patrick Mahomes
- Teddy Swims
- Carlos Alcaraz
- James Hetfield
- Mike Vrabel
- Kaytron Allen
- Teuvo Teravainen
- Mick Jagger
- Jordan Love
- Blake Shelton
- Cardi B
- Rafael Nadal
- John Foster
- Vince Young
Besides Leavitt, the list of the alleged offenders of the above celebrities included actress and TV host Whoopi Goldberg (archived here), comedians Ellen DeGeneres (archived here), Jimmy Kimmel (archived here), Suzy Eddie Izzard (archived here) and Joy Behar (archived here), U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi (archived here), Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (archived here), Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum (archived here), Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (archived here), Spanish Minister of Labour and Social Economy Yolanda Díaz (archived here), Filipino broadcast journalist Karen Davila (archived here), sportswriter Brian Windhorst (archived here), sport commentator Joe Buck (archived here), tennis players Federica Rossi (archived here), Elina Svitolina (archived here) and John McEnroe (archived here).
The claim originated from a September 19, 2025, article (archived here) published on the website (archived here) that mimicked a digital news outlet but lacked any transparency. For example, it did not have the "About" page, said nothing about the editorial team and its principles and didn't show names of the supposed authors.
According to the website's "Terms of Service" tab (archived here), its operations were run out of Vietnam:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of page at news.linkxtop.com/tos)
The website used a classic detection-avoiding technique: It changed letters in English words to similarly looking symbols or letters from different alphabets:
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of page at news.linkxtop.com/tos)
The type of the claim, its copied-and-pasted language and the way it spread fit the pattern of what Lead Stories identified as "Vietspam" -- social media campaigns to generate traffic for made-for-advertising pages (archived here) that rely on shocking headlines about celebrities coming from websites pretending to be news outlets. Lead Stories published dozens of debunks highlighting the prevalence of such schemes on Facebook.
