Key Takeaways
- Donna Kelce denied that offensive posts from 2009–2011 belonged to Travis, writing, “Not Travis’ handle and not his account!!”
- Snopes authenticated six posts mocking women’s appearances and using an ableist slur in 2023, while Travis acknowledged deleting embarrassing old tweets on New Heights.
- The posts resurfaced amid scrutiny of Travis liking a Shane Gillis clip containing a misogynistic joke, renewing questions about his female-friendly image since dating Taylor Swift.
Donna Kelce is defending her son, Travis Kelce, against a resurfaced social media post mocking women’s appearances, but her denial has a problem: The fact-checking website Snopes previously authenticated several offensive tweets attributed to him.
The 74-year-old mother of the Kansas City Chiefs tight end jumped into the controversy Saturday, October 17, after an X user tagged her in a post featuring a screenshot of an alleged 2011 tweet about cheerleaders.
"Not Travis' handle and not his account!!" Donna declared.
The scrutiny dates back to November 2023, when Snopes examined six tweets attributed to the NFL star and rated the claim that they were authentic “True.”
Among the verified messages was an April 2010 post reading, "As a man, You have something wrong with you if your going for girls that weigh more then you!!"
Another from that year read, "Haha I just caught myself judging every person that walked past me, whether they were ugly, fat, funny looking, sexy haha I'm trippin."
Other posts mocked overweight people, insulted women's appearances, and used an ableist slur. The messages were subsequently deleted, but screenshots continued to circulate.
And Travis himself previously addressed the attention surrounding his old tweets.
During a 2023 episode of New Heights, the podcast he co-hosts with his brother, Jason Kelce, the NFL star discussed his past social media activity and admitted he had been trying to remove embarrassing posts.
"F*ck. What's hilarious is nobody followed me back then," Travis said, explaining that he once treated Twitter like a personal diary.
"Sure enough, it came surface level and everybody f*cking dove into 2011," he continued. "What a f*cking year that was. What was I even f*cking doing in some of these tweets?"
The resurfaced posts have drawn renewed attention after another controversy over Kelce's apparent support for comedian Shane Gillis.
Earlier this month, Travis' Instagram account liked a video featuring Gillis' October 10 Saturday Night Live monologue, during which the comedian referred to women wearing revealing workout clothes as "whores."
Attorney and activist Cheyenne Hunt challenged the interaction, arguing that the Kelce family's considerable commercial success depends partly on presenting themselves as approachable, female-friendly personalities.
"If you're effectively capitalizing on your implied allyship to women, women have the right to ask if it's real," Hunt said in an Instagram Reel.
The scrutiny has also revived questions about how Kelce's public image has evolved since his relationship with Taylor Swift brought him an enormous new audience.
