Congressman falls for Sutherland Springs shooting hoax live on CNN

ByCraig Haley

A congressman from Texas repeated a reoccurring hoax live on CNN as he was being interviewed about the Sutherland Springs massacre.

Online hoaxers and those that are in the business of spreading misinformation wasted no time getting started in the aftermath of the November 5th Sutherland Springs shooting in Texas, and one particular reoccurring hoax made its way onto a CNN interview thanks to Texan congressman Vicente Gonzalez.

The reoccurring hoax claims that Internet comedian Sam Hyde has been named as the suspected perpetrator of whatever shooting has just taken place. Hyde has been attributed at the “lone wolf” shooter during the Mandalay Bay shootings only a month prior, as well as the Orlando nightclub shooting and the attack at San Bernardino.

Typically the hoax will involve spreading a specific photo (above) of Hyde holding a rifle along with the assertion that he is the “suspect” or “lone wolf gunman” of any particular shooting.

Of course Sam Hyde isn’t responsible for any of these massacres, this is just a silly online hoax started by equally silly pranksters looking to cause trouble for the comedian.


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While with previous shootings this nonsense online hoax was restricted to only the Internet, in this instance congressman Vicente Gonzalez managed to fall for the hoax and repeated Sam Hyde’s name during a live interview on CNN. It is not known how Gonzalez got that information, but Twitter is certainly a prime suspect.

Watch Gonazlez give Sam Hyde’s name in the video here –

It’s a demonstration that we are STILL falling for obvious fake news we see online, especially in the aftermath of such tragedies, as we all want to be among the first to discover and break the latest information; circumstances that provide the perfect conditions for the circulation of misinformation.

At the time of writing, media have named the suspect as Devin Patrick Kelley.