#AlternativeFacts / #SpicerFacts

Submission 29,931

Part of a series on Inauguration of Donald Trump. [View Related Entries]

About

#AlternativeFacts / #SpicerFacts are a pair of hashtags that emerged to mock White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer's first press conference as part of the Donald Trump administration. Using the hashtags, Twitter users tell outlandish falsehoods in reference to how Sean Spicer said easily disprovable statements about the Inauguration of Donald Trump.

Origin

On January 21st, 2017, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer held his first press conference under President Trump. There, he chastised the media for supposedly falsely reporting on the size of the crowd at Trump's inauguration. Despite photographic evidence to the contrary, Spicer insisted Trump's inauguration had the highest attendance numbers ever, echoing Trump's claim that 1.5 million people attended his inauguration when the official report placed the number at 250,000.^[1]

Spread

Following Spicer's press conferences, users began mocking the disprovable statements made by Spencer by tweeting outlandish statements with the hashtag #SpicerFacts, often with pictures of Spicer. The Daily Dot,^[2] Bustle,^[3] USA Today,^[4] and more published roundups of some of the best tweets using the hashtag.

#AlternativeFacts

Twitter users made similar jokes using the hashtag #AlternativeFacts after Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway used the term "Alternative Facts" on MSNBC's Meet the Press with Chuck Todd on January 22nd, 2017, to describe the claims Spicer made in his first press conference.

Jokes with the #AlternativeFacts hashtag also included references to knockoff pieces of pop culture in a similar vein to a recent popular Twitter meme, Can I Copy Your Homework? The jokes made Twitter Moments^[5] the following day.