Posts on social media, which have been shared thousands of times, show a text attributed to Ted Nugent, addressed to President Joe Biden, saying, ‘This Trump supporter gives you the same respect you gave my President Trump. ‘ While the musician posted this ‘letter’ on his Facebook page on November 18, 2020, a Nugent spokesman confirmed to Reuters that he was not the author of the letter.
Many of the reports begin with the introduction: “Ted Nugent wrote Joe Biden a letter via Facebook moments ago and it is fast going viral.” “Dear Vice President Biden,” it begins, “although I refused to listen to it, I understand that during your presidential acceptance speech you asked for the unity of Trump supporters.”
Recently published posts to attribute the text to Nugent are visible: here, here and here.
Linda Peterson, a spokeswoman for Ted Nugent, told Reuters in an email that “Mr. Nugent did not write the piece. ”
The confusion may arise from the message from Nugent that was shared on Facebook on November 18, 2020 (here).
After Nugent posted the letter, it was shared more than 68,200 times as of January 25, 2021. Subsequent Facebook (here, here) and blog posts (here) attributed the text to the musician.
The earliest version of the letter, found by Reuters on public Facebook groups and pages, shows that the text has been circulating since at least November 8, 2020, without an attribution to Nugent. (here, here, here). Some attribute this to an “Author unknown” (here)
Reuters could not discover the identity of the author of the letter.
VERDICT
Incorrectly attributed. Ted Nugent did post a letter to Biden on Facebook, but Nugent’s spokesman told Reuters he was not the author of the letter.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our work to actually check social media posts.