Image mixes authentic DeSantis yearbook photo with fabricated quote | Fact check

Nate Trela, USA TODAY
Updated ·2 min read
4
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

The claim: Image shows Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ yearbook picture and quote

A July 10 Instagram post (direct link, archive link) shows an image of what is purportedly Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s high school yearbook, with a quote underneath his picture.

“My Mount Rushmore is Jesus, Sir-Mixes-a-Lot, and Nintendo 64,” the text under his photo reads.

The post was liked more than 1,000 times in five days.

Follow us on Facebook! Like our page to get updates throughout the day on our latest debunks

Our rating: Altered

The image is fabricated, using an authentic image of DeSantis from his high school yearbook but adding a made-up quote. The actual yearbook has no quotes under student pictures.

Fabricated quote added under DeSantis’s picture

The image appears to be built on an authentic picture from a yearbook for Dunedin High School, said Sean Clark, director of strategic communications for Pinellas County Schools in Florida.

“This is a photo from the Dunedin High School yearbook; however, there is no quote within the yearbook photo beneath Governor DeSantis’ photo nor any other student within the yearbook,” Clark wrote in an email to USA TODAY.

Ron DeSantis 11th grade yearbook photo from Dunedin High School
Ron DeSantis 11th grade yearbook photo from Dunedin High School

DeSantis, a Republican running for president, graduated from Dunedin High in 1997. The purported quote includes pop culture references from the late 1990s including what appears to be a misspelled reference to rapper Sir Mix-a-Lot.

Fact check: Video edited to show woman telling Ron DeSantis he'll never be president

A yearbook photo was also used in a less-viral post, with DeSantis’s picture captioned “Voted most likely to get his feelings hurt by a cartoon mouse." That caption referenced the ongoing dispute between the DeSantis administration and Disney over conservative social policies and laws supported by the governor.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the claim for comment but did not immediately get a response.

AFP, the Associated Press, PolitiFact, Lead Stories and FactCheck.org also debunked the image.

Our fact-check sources:

Thank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or e-newspaper here.

Our fact-check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: DeSantis high school yearbook has no student quotes | Fact check