Are viral posts claiming Cole Allen, the suspect in the White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting, worked as a driver for dozens of celebrities real? No, that's not true: The false claim is part of an AI-generated series of articles and posts created by a spam operation managed from Vietnam. Fake fan pages are used to target North American and European Facebook users with nearly-identical posts naming dozens of actors, musicians, athletes and sports teams.
Among the false posts Lead Stories found is a post (archived here) shared by the Rap Royalty Facebook page on April 26, 2026. It read:
BREAKING: The shooter at the White House Correspondents' Dinner has been identified as 30-year-old Cole Allen from Torrance, California. Cole is a former driver for Lil Wayne, and his wife is currently working as his assistant.
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Tue Apr 28 03:31:48 2026 UTC)
(Image source: Rap Royalty Facebook page)
A Google search (archived here) for the keywords "Cole Allen driver lil wayne" found no results supporting the claim that Allen was Lil Wayne's driver.
A Facebook search (archived here) for "and his wife is currently working as his assistant" found at least 30 nearly-identical posts claiming Allen worked as a driver for these celebrities:
- Aaron Rodgers
- Alan Jackson
- Barbra Streisand
- Chaka Khan
- Cher
- Derek Hough
- Eric Braeden
- Gretchen Wilson
- Josh Gates
- Keanu Reeves
- Kevin Costner
- Kid Rock
- Kim Kardashian
- Lil Wayne
- Maurice Benard
- Meghan Markle
- Mel Gibson
- Michael W. Smith
- Miranda Lambert
- Nikki Sixx
- Paul Stanley
- Phil Collins
- Post Malone
- Rory McIlroy
- Sammy Hagar
- Samuel L. Jackson
- Savannah Guthrie
- Snoop Dogg
- T.I.
- Usher
- Yo-Yo Ma
(Image source: Lead Stories montage of Facebook screenshots)
The Facebook pages hosting these posts, including the Rap Royalty page, are all managed from Vietnam. The profile transparency page (archived here) for Rap Royalty shows three accounts manage the page from Vietnam.
(Image source: Rap Royalty page on Facebook)
The Rap Royalty post links to an article (archived here) titled "BREAKING: Iпcideпt Reported at High-Profile Washiпgtoп Eveпt." It provides no information about Allen's purported work as a driver to Lil Wayne or any celebrity.
Another feature of this article and the posts is the use of lookalike Cyrillic letters used in place of Latin letters, which may be an attempt to evade automated content moderation.
(Image source: Lead Stories screenshot of goldflow.daily24.world)
Lead Stories also identified and debunked a series of fake posts from the same operation claiming that Cole Allen worked as a production crew member on films and tours for a dozen actors and musicians.
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. Recent reporting and fact checks mentioning that country are available here.
Lead Stories has published a primer -- or a prebunk -- on how to identify these kinds of fake posts exported from Vietnam. It is titled "Prebunk: Beware Of Fake Fan Pages Spreading False Stories About Your Favorite Celebrities -- How To Spot 'Viet Spam.'"
