‘Hero’: Trump rally attendee praised as he fools Fox News in South Carolina

US president Donald Trump’s rallies ahead of the midterms are proving to be rather chaotic places, as the 80-year-old has faced several interruptions and heckles at recent events, and at Thursday’s rally at South Carolina, Fox News ended up getting tricked by an attendee who criticised the president’s fanbase.

Before Trump’s speech was disrupted by a heckler, reporter Lucas Tomlinson asked a man known only as Tom why he was there.

He replied: “Well, in the late 70s, I was a little too young to get involved and go to South America for the Jonestown Massacre, but this is as close as I’ll ever get, so that’s why I’m here.”

Confused, Tomlinson said: “Wait, the Jonestown Massacre?”

For those unfamiliar, the Jonestown Massacre occurred in 1978 and saw the death of more than 900 members of the Peoples Temple cult in a mass murder-suicide by its leader, Jim Jones.

Tom continued: “That’s right. There’s nothing like seeing a cult right up front, man.”

The exchange soon saw Tom receive widespread praise on X/Twitter, with Ron Filipkowski of MeidasTouch branding him a “hero”:

“ABSOLUTE. F***ING. LEGEND,” replied one account:

Tommy Stella, from the comic book publisher IDW, tweeted: “If you’re a liberal and you look like this it’s your DUTY to keep doing this exact bit”:

Progressive political commentator Alex Cole said: “This is genuinely one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen”:

Kentucky representative and Trump critic Thomas Massie shared the clip with the eyes emoji and an exclamation mark:

Writer Brian Gaar said: “This is like watching a perfect quarterback fake, when the entire defense gets fooled and he just strolls into the endzone”:

“This is f***ing gold,” tweeted political commentator Jamie Bonkiewicz:

And Trump biographer Seth Abramson wrote: “This may be the single best post I’ve ever seen”:

Oops.

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