Fact Check: Photo Showing Ron DeSantis Yearbook Quote is Doctored

A doctored image of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ high school yearbook recently made rounds on social media, attributing a fake quote to the GOP official.

The Details: The quote photoshopped under DeSantis’ photo read, “My Mount Rushmore is Jesus, Sir-Mixes-a-Lot, and Nintendo 64.” The tweeted photo, captioned “takes a lot of balls to run for president when you have a skeleton like this in your closet," drew charged reactions in the replies. The quote erroneously spelled the name of 1990s rapper Sir Mix-a-Lot.

For Context: The unaltered yearbook photo from DeSantis’ senior year, 1997, originally surfaced on Reddit in April. The photo previously circulated less widely with the caption “voted ‘most likely to have his feelings hurt by a cartoon mouse.’”

Key Quote: Sean Clark, a spokesperson for Pinellas County Schools, said in an email, “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.”

How The Media Covered It: The story was not widely covered, but fact-checkers covered it similarly. At the time of writing, AllSides did not find a fact check from a Right-rated source.