If you’re a celebrity or professional athlete, burner accounts are the hottest trend since cryptocurrency.
In 2017, the internet descended into chaos when it was revealed that NBA superstar Kevin Durant was using a secret burner account to drag his former coach and teammates. Not one to miss out on a golden opportunity to defend himself against the raging scorn of the internet—or muster the courage to anonymously clap back at the likes of Soledad O’Brien—it would appear that the latest public figure to join the burner account revolution is none other than Mr. Binders Full of Women himself, Mitt Romney.
The big reveal came courtesy of Slate’s Ashley Feinberg, who detected something was awry when she noticed a Twitter account attributed to Pierre Delecto follows Romney’s kids, his former aides and advisors, Romney fan pages and parody accounts, and people who tweet shit like this:
At this point, exposing burner accounts might be Fienberg’s mutant power, considering she did the same thing to former FBI Director James Comey in 2017.
As for how in the hell we got here, NBC News has the scoop:
The trail leading to Romney’s secret account began earlier Sunday when The Atlantic published a profile of Romney at a time when he is one of a few prominent Republicans to be critical of President Donald Trump’s actions on Ukraine that led House Democrats to open an impeachment inquiry.
Romney was asked about one Trump tweet in particular where the president attached the hashtag “IMPEACHMITTROMNEY,” to which the 2012 Republican presidential nominee said, “That’s kind of what he does,” and explained that he uses a secret Twitter account to follow politics.
“What do they call me, a lurker?” Romney said, declining to name the account but saying that he followed fewer than 700 accounts.
When Feinberg heard this, presumably she rubbed her hands together like a comic book supervillain and by Sunday night, The Artist Formerly Known as Mitt Romney was left with no choice but to cop to the bogus account:
No word yet on if Pierre Delecto costumes will be in stores in time for Halloween, but one thing is for certain: Romney is a prime example of what black folks would call a “clown” and what white folks would call a “total loser.”