On Thursday, the press lit up with accusations that Gov. Ron DeSantis had forcibly arrested the son of Rebekah Jones, a notorious grifter who once claimed Florida was lying about its COVID death numbers (a now debunked tale that major outlets like CNN ran with for months on end). The reason that was given? According to multiple reports, he was arrested for posting memes.

That’s how news outlets, including the Miami Herald, chose to frame the matter, and the implication was clear. Namely, that DeSantis was a fascist going after Jones in an attempt to retaliate against her for blowing the whistle.

Stick with me from here, because things are about to get really crazy.

BREAKING: 13-year-old son of Rebekah Jones, whistleblower who clashed with DeSantis, arrested over memes https://t.co/XxtygtJdNd

— julie k. brown (@jkbjournalist) April 6, 2023

The first mention of the arrest actually came from Jones on Wednesday evening after she ran to social media to proclaim an authoritarian plot against her family. Aside from some press outlets like the one mentioned above, countless left-wing accounts ran with her comments, decrying DeSantis’ supposed tyranny.

My family is not safe. My son has been taken on the gov's orders, and I've had to send my husband and daughter out of state for their safety.

THIS is the reality of living in DeSantis' Florida.

There is no freedom here. Only retaliatory rule by a fascist who wishes to be king

— Rebekah Jones (@GeoRebekah) April 6, 2023

It wasn’t long before the truth started to come out, though, and man did it change everything. In reality, Jones’ son was not arrested for posting memes, and he certainly wasn’t arrested as part of some retaliatory plot against his deranged, grifting mother. Instead, he was arrested because he had made multiple threats to commit mass murder at his school.

Before y'all rush to assume this is just DeSantis persecuting Rebekah Jones' family, please note that the alleged memes in question included threats to "shoot up the school" and "kill the losers at school."https://t.co/neHbpQjhP1 https://t.co/UMr5PL4KR4 pic.twitter.com/6roUAJsOi9

— Ashton Pittman (@ashtonpittman) April 6, 2023

At this point, I could stop writing and this story would be crazy enough. Unfortunately, it gets much worse because security camera footage later emerged of Jones actually turning her own son over to police on Wednesday.

pic.twitter.com/7L9zAlwmPZ https://t.co/McgPiVGKlp

— Max (@MaxNordau) April 6, 2023

In other words, this arrest wasn’t out of the blue. She actually facilitated it and knew exactly what was on the warrant. She knew about the messages showing her son threatening to commit a mass shooting. She knew that Ron DeSantis had absolutely nothing to do with what was happening.

Yet, she still went to social media to pretend that police had simply shown up at her doorstep and forcibly taken her son under false pretenses…and the press ran with it. They ran with a complete and total lie in order to try to smear DeSantis.

That’s psychopathy and media malpractice at a level rarely seen, and it’s not like the current environment isn’t ripe with lunacy at any given moment. Jones is obviously a very mentally ill individual. She has run multiple scams over the years, but this truly takes the cake for shamelessness. She turned her own son in to the police and then used his arrest as a way to spin a farcical tale about DeSantis oppressing her in order to gin up press coverage.

The Miami Herald should be shuttered after this. So should the other outlets that pushed this nonsense (such as The Daily Beast). These are outlets that have been burned multiple times by Jones in the past, yet their obsession with attacking DeSantis led them to get played by her again. It’s not like this story was even believable in its original form either. It was obviously false from the get-go, and they just couldn’t help themselves.

This had to be the end for Jones. Not even the most liberal of press outlets and far-left influencers could take her seriously after this, right? On second thought, I’m probably putting a little too much faith in humanity supposing that.