A transgender helicopter pilot was forced to respond after she was falsely identified as the captain of the Black Hawk that crashed in Washington, D.C.
Jo Ellis has served in the Virginia National Guard for 15 years and on Friday found herself the subject of thousands of false social media posts claiming that she was the third crew member aboard the helicopter that collided with the passenger jet, carrying 64 people.
She resorted to posting a “proof of life” video on Facebook to stop the baseless rumors.
“Jo Ellis” was trending on X on Friday morning and there were more than 90,000 posts spewing the false claims, The New York Times reports.
One of them which had been reposted many times said that Ellis “has been making radicalized anti-Trump statements on socials.”
President Donald Trump and Republicans blamed diversity, equity, and inclusion programs for the deadly Wednesday night plane crash between the military helicopter and a commercial jet near Ronald Reagan National Airport.
As a result, the false social media posts about Ellis attempted to tie her transgender identity to the crash.
“I understand some people have associated me with the crash in D.C. and that is false,” Ellis said in a video on her Facebook profile. “It is insulting to the families to try to tie this to some sort of political agenda. They don’t deserve that. I don’t deserve this. And I hope y’all know that I am alive and well.”
Two of the three soldiers aboard the helicopter have been named so far. The name of the third crew member, who is reportedly female, will not be released by the Army after the family requested privacy.
“Some craziness has happened on the internet and I’m being named as one of the pilots of the DC crash,” Ellis responded. “Please report any accounts or posts you see. It’s insulting to the victims and families of those lost and they deserve better than this BS from the bots and trolls of the internet.”
At a White House briefing on Thursday, when pressed about his claim DEI was responsible for the crash, Trump responded: “It just could have been.”
He added that he reached the conclusion because “I have common sense.”
Trump also claimed without evidence that the Biden and Obama administrations had lowered aviation hiring standards. He criticized an effort to hire people with disabilities that existed throughout his entire first term in office.
“I put safety first,” Trump claimed. “Obama, Biden and the Democrats put policy first, and they put politics at a level that nobody’s ever seen because this was the lowest level.”