'What a disgrace': Virginia Dem Susanna Gibson who streamed sex acts online trolled for claiming victimhood

RICHMOND, VIRGINIA: Susanna Gibson, a former Virginia House of Delegates candidate, has opened up about her experience after explicit videos of her and her husband surfaced online, leading to her election loss earlier this year.

Gibson, a Democrat, nurse practitioner, and mother of two, asserted that she was a victim of an invasion of privacy orchestrated by Republican operatives. “It is a feeling that I would not wish on my worst enemy,” Gibson told Politico of the explicit videos that circulated online ahead of her election defeat.

Impact on personal life

The Washington Post initially reported the story, detailing how archived livestream videos of Gibson engaging in intimate acts with her husband were discovered on a site called Chaturbate in September 2022.

The couple allegedly solicited payments from viewers in exchange for specific acts, a revelation that garnered attention and controversy.

Gibson insisted that she was the target of “an illegal invasion of my privacy designed to humiliate me and my family” after news broke and Republican operatives shared the story before the election. Despite the scandal, she remained in the race until her eventual loss.

In her interview with Politico, Gibson reiterated her belief that she was a victim of a media hit job and an illegal distribution scheme of the videos.

“My entire life was rocked on Sept. 11, when the article ran. It ran, implying that I performed sex acts online with my husband for money. It was really written based on this Dropbox file that self-described Republican operatives shopped around," she said.

“They had found these videos on the dark web and shopped them around to various news outlets. I didn’t have any idea that there were ever videos of me that had been made and uploaded to multiple sites,” Gibson continued. 

“When you find out that there are sexually explicit videos of you online, especially by being contacted by national reporters — it is a feeling that I would not wish on my worst enemy.”

Addressing the distribution of the explicit content, Gibson argued, “Content that is initially made in a consensual context, which is then distributed in a non-consensual context digitally, is a crime.”

Gibson also discussed the blurred line between the consensual sharing of intimate content and its unauthorized dissemination.

She told the outlet. “Choosing to share content, online or in whatever medium, with select people with the understanding that it will disappear and can only be seen by those present at the time — when we’re talking live streaming, webcamming, and Skype — that is a far cry from consenting for that content to be recorded and then broadly disseminated. And there is case law precedent confirming this."

She added, “I think what people do in their private lives, digitally — if it is legal, it is consensual and has no bearing on their ability to do their jobs — I think there should be a barrier. I think that it is unethical to make people’s private lives — especially their sexual private lives — public and part of how we think about them and their ability to do their jobs and make positive contributions to their communities.”

Social media backlash

Despite her claims, many on social media trolled the candidate for playing the victim.

"Hahahaha! And her children will see this. What a disgrace," one posted on X (formerly Twitter).

"They always the victim," another offered.

"Did she ever consider not making porn?" someone else wondered.

"Is she on OnlyDems," another quipped, referencing the adult streaming site OnlyFans. 

Gibson, however, warned that incidents like hers might become more common as millennials, who have been found in studies to engage in similar activities, age into running for office. "There was a 2014 study conducted by McAfee that said or showed that 90 percent of millennial women have taken nude photos at some point," she added.

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