Surprise: Man Who Claimed Not A ‘Trumper’ After Pranking Biden Is A Trump Supporter

The man who recently gained widespread media coverage for using a veiled conservative expletive when speaking to President Joe Biden has surprised virtually no one by revealing that he falsely believes Donald Trump is his president, despite initially trying to convince the public otherwise.

On Christmas Eve, the Bidens were fielding calls for the annual NORAD Santa Claus tracking service when they spoke with a southern Oregon parent – 35-year-old Jared Schmeck – who ended an initially polite conversation with, “Merry Christmas and let’s go, Brandon.”

Schmeck spoke with The Oregonian on Saturday, in which he said the comment was made in jest and that he was not a “Trumper.” While the denial made its way around the media, it struck an obviously dissonant tone considering the phrase’s origin.

“Let’s go, Brandon” has been quickly grown to become a kind of slur that conservatives use to insult Biden after a TV reporter mistakenly thought a NASCAR race crowd was chanting the phrase for winner Brandon Brown when spectators were actually yelling, “Fuck Joe Biden.” Trump supporters reveled online at Schmeck’s prank on the president, who responded at the time with, “Let’s go Brandon, I agree.”

Schmeck appeared on Monday in an interview with Steve Bannon, a Trump ally who was indicted by a federal grand jury in November and charged with criminal contempt of Congress after defying a subpoena by the House Jan. 6 Committee. The committee is investigating Bannon’s involvement in the Capitol insurrection by Trump supporters who had tried to stop Biden from becoming president.

On Bannon’s show “War Room,” Schmeck – donning an unsurprising red Make America Great Again hat – contradicted his remarks from the Oregonian interview and confidently said he believes the false claim that “the election was 100% stolen.”

“Donald Trump is my president and he should still be president right now,” the former police officer said, adding that his telling the phrase to Biden was his way of expressing dissatisfaction with the president.

Every audit in every state that conducted one has shown that Biden won the election. The president won 306 votes in Electoral College, while Trump received 232. Biden also won the popular vote by more than 7 million.

After Schmeck’s initial remarks, amateur sleuths dug into his background and mocked him for turning an annual Christmas tradition for children into a political stunt. According to The Oregonian, he works for an electric company in Central Point, Oregon, whose website appeared to be down and its Yelp page filled with negative comments.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.