A viral video circulating on social media seems to show Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene auditioning for American Idol in Season 1, but it’s not actually her. The woman in the video does resemble the congresswoman quite a bit, but reporters from TMZ have now confirmed that it was not her. Viewers who believed this was Greene using a stage name are now sadly disappointed.
The video shows a woman named Stefanie Sugarman auditioning for American Idol in 2002 when its very first season was being filmed. Some viewers suggested that this sweet-sounding name might be a pseudonym chosen by a younger version of Greene with aspirations as a performer. Sugarman does bear a physical resemblance to Greene, especially when allowing for the passage of two decades and the low-resolution video quality of the time. However, TMZ was able to debunk this story simply by confirming that Sugarman herself is real.
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In the old audition footage, Sugarman says that she is from Alto Loma, California and that she is 23 years old. Public records show that she was not lying, and she can even be traced to the modern day. Sugarman changed her last name when she married, and she is now 43 years old as expected. She did not comment on this resurfaced video or the comparisons to Greene.
Of course, Greene herself has a well-documented background – born in 1974 she is five years older than Sugarman, and she was born and raised in Georgia. It is virtually impossible that she also occupied the persona of Sugarman during that time, as some commenters have suggested. However, Greene herself is strongly associated with conspiracy theories, so it’s no wonder that they have now proliferated around her.
Greene has promoted extremist ideology such as “Pizzagate,” “QAnon” and “the white genocide conspiracy theory” – mostly since she was elected to the U.S. Congress. She was permanently banned from Twitter after repeatedly posting misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic, so she is unable to weigh in on this viral video fiasco herself.
The comparison seems to come mostly from Sugarman’s bombastic performance on American Idol in the resurfaced clip. After the truth was widely reported, many commenters wondered how the two women would feel about the comparison. Neither has made a public comment yet.
