Today’s political arena is dramatically different than it was just a few years ago. Many U.S. citizens get their news from social media platforms like X, Instagram and Facebook even more than respected news outlets — why read an article written by a credible journalist when you can just hear it from this random girl you went to high school with 20 years ago?
Well, typically, the article written by the credible journalist won’t deliver the information with their opinion entirely intertwined and in the form of a fun meme that you can share with your followers.
When former President Donald Trump’s campaign and supporters caught wind of the news that Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate and Vice Presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) signed a bill last year requiring schools to provide free menstrual products in all public school bathrooms, they began to maturely dub him “Tampon Tim.”
How did ‘Tampon Tim’ start?
The Minnesota law, which went into effect on Jan. 1, mandates that menstrual products including pads, tampons and other items “must be available to all menstruating students in restrooms regularly used by students in grades 4 to 12 according to a plan developed by the school district,” as reported by The Hill.
Minnesota State Republican lawmakers pushed back on the legislation, which didn’t specify that the law would only apply to girls’ bathrooms. Most people would assume that’s the case, but the lack of specificity was ammunition for Trump’s campaign to turn the loophole into a new viral conversation.
Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt called out Walz for the law shortly after Harris announced that he would be her presidential ticket running mate, according to The Hill.
“As a woman, I think there is no greater threat to our health than leaders who support gender-transition surgeries for young minors, who support putting tampons in men’s bathrooms in public schools,” Leavitt said on Fox News. “Those are radical policies that Tim Walz supports. He actually signed a bill to do that.”
Additionally, the Make America Great Again Inc. account wrote Tuesday on the social platform X: “What could be weirder than signing a bill requiring schools to stock tampons in boys’ bathrooms? Or weirder than signing legislation allowing minors to receive sex change operations?”
Quite a stretch.
Walz roasts Vance
Walz clapped back at the burn during the Harris-Walz rally in Philadelphia yesterday by delivering a quip targeted at the Republican Vice President nominee JD Vance. “JD studied at Yale, had his career funded by Silicon Valley millionaires, and then wrote a bestseller trashing that community,” Walz said. “C’mon; that’s not what middle America is.”
Then came the roast: “And I gotta tell ya; I can’t wait to debate this guy,” Walz said. “That’s if he’s willing to get off the couch and show up. See what I did there?”
The joke appeared to be off-script, given the facial and body language reaction of Harris amid the sustained cheers, laughter, and roar of the bipartisan crowd.
What’s the JD Vance couch story?
The reference alludes to the baseless and vastly-shared claim that Vance admitted to having sex with a couch in his memoir, as reported by Guardian.
When Vance was announced as Trump’s running mate on the Republican ticket, a wild accusation was made on X by a user who has since deleted the post that said: “can’t say for sure but he might be the first vp pick to have admitted in a ny times bestseller to fucking an inside-out latex glove shoved between two couch cushions (vance, hillbilly elegy, pp. 179-181).”
The fake page citation from Vance’s bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy was fact-checked by The Associated Press and was later removed. To be clear, Vance didn’t write about having intercourse with a couch.
But, not before the Internet memes about the claim started to spread like wildfire.
Even Harris’ team tweeted a reference to the couch story in response to Vance’s comment about the Vice President being a “childless cat lady.”