Fact Check: Howard Stern Lost Nearly 1M Subscribers After Interview with Harris?

Claim:

Radio host Howard Stern lost nearly 1 million subscribers after his interview with U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris.

Rating:

Labeled Satire ( About this rating? )

A rumor that radio personality Howard Stern's lost nearly 1 million subscribers after he interviewed U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris circulated online in the weeks ahead of the 2024 presidential election. For example, the Facebook page America - Love It Or Leave It posted about it on Oct. 9, 2024:

Howard Stern lost nearly a million subscribers within an hour of his "big interview" with Kamala: "It was nothing but softballs"

(Facebook/America - Love It Or Leave It)

Some readers seemed to interpret the rumor as a factual recounting of real-life events. However, there was no evidence that Stern's subscription numbers had shrunk.

Rather, the rumor about Stern suffering the consequences of his interview with Harris originated with America - Love It Or Leave It — a social media account affiliated with America's Last Line of Defense , which describes its output as being humorous or satirical in nature. Its main page on Facebook states:

A subsidiary of the America's Last Line of Defense network of trollery. Nothing on this page is real.

The fictional story spread after Stern criticized Harris' opponent, former President Donald Trump, and his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, during the interview.

ALLOD has a history of making up stories for shares and comments, sometimes relying on artificial-intelligence writing software to do its storytelling.

Snopes has addressed similar satirical claims from ALLOD in the past, including the assertion that singer Taylor Swift lost 30 million followers after she endorsed Harris and a rumor that Swift lost a $150 million deal with Walmart for the same reason.

For background, here is why we alert readers to rumors created by sources that call their output humorous or satirical.