I can’t label this false because it would involve proving a negative, but there is no documented historical or DNA evidence for this whatsoever. To proclaim it as historical fact is completely irresponsible, yet completely unsurprising that the original tweet got over 200K likes.
▪️Madison never had any children with his wife Dolly, which made some historians suspect he was infertile (though this is also unproven). The slave child claim comes from Bettye Kearse, who’s story rest on an “oral history” passed down through the generations.
https://montpelierdescendants.org/2021/02/12/bettyekearse/
▪️While it’s certainly not out of the realm of possibility, her claims haven’t been corroborated by any historical documents or DNA evidence, unlike other famous examples like Jefferson’s children with Sally Hemings. There’s no evidence Madison ever met this woman or that she even existed.
▪️When Y-chromosones of Kearse’s male cousins were analyzed, markers of a typically West African gene cluster were found, meaning their patriarchal male ancestor was probably from Africa. It’s possible, but rare, that a European man (i.e. Madison) would have a West African haplogroup.
▪️Kearse also later compared her genealogy with another willing female Madison descendant, but their genetic family trees didn’t intersect at any point.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/lifestyle/dna-madison/
▪️Unfortunately, no willing white male Madison descendants have been found to compare results to, either in the US or England. This would be necessary to compare the Y chromosomes to Kearse’s black male cousins to see if they match.
▪️However, even if they did match it still wouldn’t prove the claim, it would only prove that she was a descendant of James Madison’s father (i.e. one of his brothers could also be the source) since there are no known descendants of President Madison. Still, it would vastly strengthen the credibility for Kearse’s claims.
▪️But as of now, there is no such evidence, and the available DNA evidence suggest it’s unlikely she’s related to Madison. Thus, to put forth this meme as fact is ahistorical nonsense, and why it’s not found in any reputable history books.
It’s bizarre to see them seesaw back and forth that Trump is totally clueless and aloof, just golfing all day, then all of a sudden he’s a dangerous king/dictator who’s diligently plotting to seize absolute power.
▪️This one is frustrating because, while it’s nice to see the vigor and speed that DOGE is acting with, they’re also sloppy with some of their findings. This is not some bombshell, millions of dead people’s SS numbers aren’t being paid out to fraudsters.
▪️This problem has been known for some time, you can read an inspector general’s report from 2015 about millions of names on the SS “numident” not being correctly annotated for deaths, even though they were older than 112 (the oldest known American at the time).
https://oig-files.ssa.gov/audits/full/A-06-14-34030_0.pdf
▪️There are innocent explanations for some of these. Expatriates that died outside the country, for example. Or immigrants given temporary work permit who returned to their country, people issued new numbers for various reasons, etc. However, most are simply due to the govt not diligently keeping track of deaths.
▪️It’s embarrassing that the govt has millions of numbers on the numident that are ...
