The Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi became the target of fake news, which claimed her two daughters, Melissa and Daphane were arrested for breaking into a liquor store during coronavirus quarantine. The fake piece of news recently gathered momentum in the wake of the recent violent protests that resulted in mass looting incidents in the US.
The factually incorrect piece of news first appeared on Bustatroll.org, on May 11. The website describes itself as a subsidiary of the "America's Last Line of Defense" network of parody, satire, and tomfoolery.
Pelosi's Daughters Needed Vital Quarantine Supplies
The article stated that Pelosi's daughters were arrested after they broke into 'This Is The Way To Liquor,' a liquor store in San Francisco, California. Claiming that the daughters followed their mother's footsteps towards alcohol addiction, the website wrote 'the apples don't fall far from the tree'. The police was alerted after a silent alarm went on in the liquor store that was temporarily closed due to slow sales in wake of coronavirus lockdown, reported the website.
The report even included a quote from the officer who 'arrested' Pelosi's daughters. "The two girls were absolutely obliterated drunk. They thought that they had every right to be there for being loyal customers over the years and couldn't understand why we had come to arrest them. They shouted out that they had to be there because they needed 'vital quarantine supplies," police officer Joe Barron was quoted by Bustatroll.
"When it did finally dawn on them that they were going to lock-up, they simply laughed and said that mommy would get them out right away and that I would lose my job for arresting 'California royalty,' as they called themselves. That was all I needed to hear. The handcuffs went on, and the daughters Pelosi pent the night in the drunk tank. I wish we could've kept the spoiled brats even longer," he went on to add.
Who are Melissa and Daphane?
According to Snopes, the report was not only fake but also a work of satire. Pelosi, who married, Paul Frank Pelosi in 1963, has one son and four daughters including Nancy Corinne, Christine, Jacqueline, and Alexandra. None of her daughters are named Melissa or Daphane as claimed by the fake news.
Furthermore, the outlet found that the photograph used in the story, claiming to Melissa and Daphane, is of Michaella McCollum and Melissa Reid. The duo, famously known as 'Peru Two', was arrested for drug smuggling in 2013.
However, despite the news being fake, it was republished by a few websites and shared widely on Twitter, recently. "His daughter is a product of his inability to even lead in his own home - and she looks crazy as fk...gets arrested, as did Pelosi's daughter - and charges magically disappear... Just what we need - a society of sickos - and we have been seeing just how numerous they are," expressed a user on Twitter.
