About

"Beto Is a Furry" is a satirical expression claiming that 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke is a furry in reference to video footage of him performing in a sheep costume with his band The Sheeps in 2003.

Origin

On December 30th, 2013, YouTuber elephantandseal uploaded footage of O'Rourke playing with his band The Sheeps while wearing a sheep costume at Moontime Pizza in El Paso, Texas (shown below).

On January 23rd, 2019, the progressive news site Mother Jones^[5] published an article about the video footage, which Twitter^[1] user Nick Baumann tweeted along with the message "Beto O'Rourke is a furry" (shown below).

Spread

That day, Twitter user @ComfortablySmug^[2] tweeted "All meme factories switch to full Beto furry meme production until further notice" (shown below). Meanwhile, the parody account @BetosFurryBlog^[4] was created.

Also on January 23rd, @ComfortablySmug posted a poll asking "is it true you are a furry, @BetoORourke ?" (shown below). The poll ended with "YES" claiming 93% of 1,523 votes.

On March 30th, @ComfortablySmug^[7] replied to a tweet by O'Rourke with the message "I wonder how many 'Beto is a furry' replies this tweet will get" (shown below). Shortly after, the phrase "Beto is a furry" began trending on the platform.

That day, the news site El Paso Times^[6] published an article titled "Why is ‘Beto is a furry' trending after his El Paso rally?" by Hana Khalyleh. The following day, New York Times editor Erin McCann tweeted a screenshot of the headline in a thread criticizing the article (shown below). On April 1st, 2019, the news site FreeBeacon^[3] reported that the El Paso Times had removed the article about the "Beto Is a Furry" meme.

Search Interest

External References