‘JUVENILE’

Trump-Backed Candidate Says Gay Hookup Profile Was Ex-Intern’s ‘Prank’: Report

A former intern took credit in a statement for creating Bernie Moreno’s profile, saying he was “thoroughly embarrassed” by the “aborted prank” he had pulled.

Bernie Moreno, a business executive and Trump-backed candidate for the Ohio Republican Senate nomination, is denying a report that links him to a profile seeking “Men for 1-on-1 sex” on a casual hookup website. Instead, Moreno’s lawyer told the Associated Press, which published the report on Thursday, the profile was created by a mischievous former intern. The news agency linked the profile “nardo19672,” which advertised its user was “looking for young guys to have fun with while traveling,” to Moreno’s work email address through data that was leaked from Adult Friend Finder in 2016. The AP noted that it could not verify whether Moreno had created the account himself—only that someone with access to his email had. On Thursday night, his lawyer provided a statement from the intern, Dan Ricci, who admitted to the whole “juvenile prank.” Ricci said he was “thoroughly embarrassed by an aborted prank I pulled on my friend, and former boss, Bernie Moreno, nearly two decades ago.” The AP also could not independently confirm the veracity of Ricci’s statement. Ricci did not respond to the agency’s inquiries.