Political intrigue is occurring in a competitive Virginia House of Delegate race. It’s a sex scandal—sort of. Susanna Gibson, the Democratic candidate and a nurse practitioner, had some of her prior work exposed to the public. That was a series of sex acts performed with her husband that were posted on Chaturbate. The media is trying to frame this as a leaked sex tape story, another episode in the annals of dirty politics. The New York Times headline: State House Candidate in Virginia Condemns Leak of Sex Tapes (via NYT):
A Democratic candidate in a crucial race for the Virginia General Assembly denounced reports on Monday that she and her husband had performed live on a sexually explicit streaming site.
Susanna Gibson, a nurse practitioner running in her first election cycle, said in a statement that the leaks about the online activity were “an illegal invasion of my privacy designed to humiliate me and my family.”
The Washington Post and The Associated Press reported on Monday that tapes of live-streamed sexual activity had been recorded from a pornographic site and archived on another site. The New York Times has not independently verified the content of the videos. The Democratic Party of Virginia did not respond to a request for comment.
Ms. Gibson, 40, who appears on her campaign website in hospital scrubs as well as at home with her husband and two young children, is running for the House of Delegates in one of only a handful of competitive races that will determine control of the General Assembly. Republicans hold a slim majority in the House, and Democrats narrowly control the State Senate, but both chambers are up for grabs in November.
Ms. Gibson’s district, which is outside Richmond and primarily in Henrico County, is one of seven tossup seats in the 100-member House, according to the nonpartisan Virginia Public Access Project.
Here’s The Washington Post:
A Democrat running for a crucial seat in Virginia’s House of Delegates performed sex acts with her husband for a live online audience and encouraged viewers to pay them with “tips” for specific requests, according to online videos viewed by The Washington Post.
Susanna Gibson, a nurse practitioner and mother of two young children running in a highly competitive suburban Richmond district, streamed sex acts on Chaturbate, a platform that says it takes its name from “the act of masturbating while chatting online.”
Chaturbate videos are streamed live on that site and are often archived on other publicly available sites. More than a dozen videos of the couple captured from the Chaturbate stream were archived on one of those sites — Recurbate — in September 2022, after she entered the race. The most recent were two videos archived on Sept. 30, 2022. It is unclear when the live stream occurred.
[…]
Gibson, 40, can be seen in the videos soliciting “tips” for performing specific acts — in apparent violation of Chaturbate’s terms and conditions, which say: “Requesting or demanding specific acts for tips may result in a ban from the Platform for all parties involved.”
In at least two videos, she tells viewers she is “raising money for a good cause.”
In multiple videos, Gibson interrupts sex acts to type into a bedside computer. Speaking directly into the screen, she urges viewers to provide tips, which are paid through “tokens” purchased through the site. In at least two videos, she agrees to perform certain acts only in a “private room,” an arrangement that requires the viewer to pay more.
There might be articles and segments about the double standard regarding women in politics and sex scandals and how the evil patriarchy is up to its usual tricks. Ignore it all because these clips weren’t leaked. She posted them on an adult online streaming site, and Gibson didn’t know they could return to haunt her. It’s like deleted tweets and Facebook posts. The Internet is forever; if she thought her opponents wouldn’t use this, she should have remained in medicine.
Only a Democrat could post videos on Chaturbate for the whole world to watch her doing anal, and get the @nytimes coverage to be about “leak of sex tapes” and “invasion of privacy”
— Brent Scher (@BrentScher) September 12, 2023
It was all on the internet until about 3 days ago! pic.twitter.com/nqbPMRbL7s
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