EDGELORDS

Leaked Group Chat Shows Team DeSantis Workshopping Meme Videos: Report

At least one campaign staffer praised an incendiary video with Nazi imagery in it, texting in a campaign group chat, “This belongs in the Smithsonian.”

Members of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign team spitballed ideas for meme videos in an now-defunct internal group chat before offloading them on anonymous and friendly Twitter accounts for dissemination, according to texts obtained by Semafor. The laundering operation, which took place in a now-defunct internal group chat called “War Room Creative Ideas,” involved at least two highly controversial videos—one featuring anti-LGBTQ+ content and another including Nazi imagery. The Nazi video, retweeted by staffers after being pushed out by the anonymous @desantiscams, was praised by at least one staffer in the Signal group chat. “This belongs in the Smithsonian,” texted Kyle Lamb, then the campaign’s director of research and data. (He has since been fired from the campaign, along with 37 other staffers, including the 25-year-old communications aide who allegedly created the video.) Other texts viewed by Semafor show staffers sharing images to include in the clip, though not the Nazi symbol that eventually ended up in the published version. According to Semafor, the chat was shuttered after the video drew fierce criticism, going viral in a major misstep for the campaign.