No, gay dating apps won’t out ‘closeted Republicans’ amid SCOTUS same-sex marriage decision

A viral social media post claimed that after the US Supreme Court was formally asked to overturn same-sex marriage, gay dating apps were planning to out ‘closeted Republican officials’ – but it’s not true.

The US Supreme Court was asked this week to consider hearing a case from former county clerk Kim Davis, which seeks to overturn same-sex marriage across the United States.

Davis spent six days in jail in 2015, when she refused to grant a gay couple a marriage licences following the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling; in the new appeal, which SCOTUS is considering to hear, Davis is appealing a $100,000 jury verdict for emotional damages as well as $260,000 for attorneys’ fees.

But the case, if considered, could represent a threat to federal protections for same-sex marriage, on the grounds that it is unconstitutional.

All of that is why a post on X from “comedy and satire” account The Halfway Post has gone super viral, and been viewed over 7.2 million times, according to the platforms ‘impressions’ metric.

“BREAKING: Several gay dating apps are reportedly threatening that, if the Supreme Court bans gay marriage, they’ll reveal all the closeted Republican officials and members of Congress who have accounts on their platforms,” the 12 August post reads.

BREAKING: Several gay dating apps are reportedly threatening that, if the Supreme Court bans gay marriage, they'll reveal all the closeted Republican officials and members of Congress who have accounts on their platforms.

— The Halfway Post (@HalfwayPost) August 12, 2025

Though many have taken the statement as true, the account later followed up, clarifying that the ‘breaking news’ was satire.

“This one should be true, shouldn’t it? Comedy is cathartic in fascist eras such as ours,” it wrote.

Similar posts taking the original satirical statement as fact have gone similarly viral.

For example, a verbatim post on the Facebook page for the ‘U.S. Democratic Socialists’ has at time of reporting been liked nearly 150 thousand times, and been shared over 20 thousand times.

Dash MacIntyre, the name behind the Halfway Post, explains in their manifesto that the online publication “doesn’t report the facts, it improves them.” It adds that it “writes fake news to resist the biggest purveyor of fake news of all: Donald Trump.”

TL;DR – no, apps like Grindr, Scruff or Sniffies are not threatening to out Republicans. No statements from any of those platforms have commented on the story.

In a petition filed with the Supreme Court last month, Kim Davis’ lawyer Mat Staver said: “Obergefell was egregiously wrong, deeply damaging, far outside the bound of any reasonable interpretation of the various constitutional provisions to which it vaguely pointed [and set out] on a collision course with the constitution from the day it was decided.

“This flawed opinion has produced disastrous results, leaving individuals like Davis find[ing] it increasingly difficult to participate in society without running [foul] of Obergefell and its effect on other anti-discrimination laws, and, until the court revisits its ‘creation of atextual constitutional rights,’ Obergefell will continue to have ruinous consequences for religious liberty.”

The petition states Davis’ case “presents the ideal opportunity to revisit substantive due process that ‘lacks any basis in the Constitution’”.

William Powell, the attorney for the couple that sued Davis in 2015, wrote in a statement to Newsweek that he is “confident the Supreme Court will likewise agree that Davis’s arguments do not merit further attention.”

If the case is considered and Davis’ appeal granted, then equal marriage would very likely return to how it was Obergefell vs. Hodges – whereby the legality of same-sex marriage was decided on a state-by-state basis.

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