JD Vance’s feelings got hurt by a cat lady’s Instagram account—so he blocked her from entering one of his taxpayer-funded events, a political influencer alleges.
Amanda McGonigle, a self-confessed Vance troll, was shunned from the vice president’s May event in Bangor, Maine, by Secret Service agents who told her, “We know where you stand.” Now, she’s suing the Executive Office of the President and the Secret Service for violating her First Amendment rights.
McGonigle, 37, launched the Instagram account CatsonaCouch in September 2024 with a mission “to troll the current administration and have more followers than JD Vance.” The username was inspired by Vance’s 2021 comment deriding “childless cat ladies” in the Democratic Party, which he described in his new book as “one of the dumbest things” he has ever said.
The account has amassed nearly two million followers committed to trolling Vance with a variety of gimmicks, from sharing memes poking fun at bogus claims about him getting intimate with a couch, to printing out mock “Wanted” posters depicting him as a law enforcement target over the death of Pope Francis.
But McGonigle and her followers, whom she calls her “petty besties,” also regularly take their cat-themed brand of activism beyond Instagram—earning the ire of the vice president and his team.
On May 14, McGonigle went to Bangor, where Vance was expected to deliver remarks touting the Trump administration’s efforts to combat healthcare fraud. The vice president was accompanied by acting Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling.
McGonigle registered for the event via a publicly accessible form and later received a confirmation and guest guidance, both on White House and the vice president’s letterhead. She had been standing in line for about 30 minutes when a group of five officials, including two armed Secret Service officers, approached her.
“Not one, not two—five. For me, a girl with a cat meme account on the internet. They called me out by name,” she said in a video recounting her experience. “[They] pulled me out of line and told me that I couldn’t attend.”
“When I asked why—considering the fact that I had registered, received confirmation, and followed all the rules—they said, ‘It’s a private event and we know where you stand.’”
McGonigle protested, but the officials insisted that the event was private. She and a friend were ejected from the line.
On Tuesday, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against the Executive Office of the President, which organized the event, and the Secret Service for violating McGonigle’s First Amendment rights.
The lawsuit, first obtained by the Daily Beast, calls out “First Amendment retaliation and viewpoint discrimination” at official events held by Vance. It alleges that the two agencies have a practice of excluding McGonigle, citing another May event in Des Moines, Iowa, that she registered to attend but never received confirmation for, unlike other registrants.
In July 2025, at a protest co-organized by McGonigle during Vance’s visit to Nantucket, Massachusetts, a Secret Service officer told her that “of course” they knew about the Instagram account, according to the lawsuit.
“It’s absurd that the Secret Service is wasting their time tracking a satirical cat account on social media,” McGonigle said in a statement. “The First Amendment protects our right to criticize the government, and it’s well within my rights to say that I think JD Vance is an unlikeable idiot.”
The White House and Vance’s press secretary did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Secret Service said it does not comment on pending or proposed litigation.
McGonigle’s attorney, Anahita Sotoohi with the American Civil Liberties Union, told the Daily Beast that the case strikes at the heart of the First Amendment, which protects the freedom to express political views without fear of retribution—even when done with flair and levity.
“The freedom to mock has been a central tenet of American political discourse since the founding,” she said. “The First Amendment cannot be revoked just because one of the country’s most powerful people can’t take a joke.”
