JD Vance may have made an unfortunate gaffe in his first post on TikTok, promoting an appearance on the “Nelk Boys” podcast in a room with several white couches, nudging trolls to remind viewers of the bizarre furniture-amorous memes that have become viral in recent weeks.
A claim about Donald Trump’s running mate and purported sexual relations with a couch was quickly debunked (though the Associated Press pulled their fact check.) Still, the rumor’s legacy will seemingly continue to haunt the VP nominee.
The Thursday video, the first under Vance’s verified account, garnered thousands of comments in its first day, with a majority referring to his “couch-f***er energy,” as John Oliver put it.
“JD Vance just eyeing those new couches,” the top comment on the post reads, while others drew attention to the Senator’s “never-Trump” past.
Other couch-related remarks, netting hundreds of likes, included: “Letting him near a couch is insane work,” and “No couch is safe with JD around.”
Vance, who already raised eyebrows when he joked at a rally that his wife would make him sleep on the couch, has spent many of his early stumps pressing back on the Harris campaign’s allegation that he and Trump are “weird.”
Though the comments underscore the aura of “weirdness” that has plagued Vance for the first three weeks or so of his candidacy, a glimpse into the nominee’s metrics fall in line with his historic unpopularity.
Vance’s first post earned less than 120,000 likes more than 24 hours after it was posted, eclipsed in the same timeframe by a post from Harris’ campaign account, “Kamala HQ,” trolling Vance’s most cringe-worthy moments and garnering over 150,000 likes.
The candidate drew in just under 70,000 followers in his first 24 hours, a far cry from Harris’ explosive 1.6 million followers in her first 16 hours, and Trump’s 3 million on his first day on the platform.