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| - A rumor that U.S. military officials were having problems stopping soldiers from sarcastically yelling "For Epstein!" when saluting spread online in March 2026.
For example, one X user wrote in a March 9 post (archived), "Military officials are reportedly having problems getting the soldiers training for a potential Iranian invasion to stop sarcastically yelling, "For Epstein!" every time they salute each other."
The story spread as the U.S. government deployed thousands of troops to the Middle East amid its joint military campaign with Israel. When the U.S. and Israel began striking Iran in late February 2026 — killing Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — U.S. President Donald Trump was embroiled in claims regarding his involvement with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The claim spread across multiple platforms, racking up millions of views. Some users seemed to interpret the rumor about the soldiers' sarcastic joke as true. Snopes readers contacted us to investigate its legitimacy.
The rumor was fictional. It originated from a website that described the scenario about soldiers jokingly saluting to Epstein as satire — a parody of political news.
To determine the rumor's origin, we first searched on Yahoo (archived) and Google. If there were any actual evidence that U.S. military officials couldn't get soldiers to stop saluting Epstein, it's likely journalists with reputable news outlets, such as The Associated Press or Reuters, would have reported on it.
(Google)
Perhaps even more likely, there would have been testimony from soldiers or others perpetuating the joke or claiming to have witnessed it on social media. Internet search inquiries would have uncovered such evidence. That was not the case.
The top posts spreading the rumor across several platforms stemmed from The Halfway Post, which first shared the claim on March 9, 2026 (archived). The Halfway Post is a well-known satire site that we've repeatedly debunked, as noted on the platform's Medium About Page:
The Halfway Post's comedy is award-winning, and has earned the most esteemed rating in the satire industry of "Pants On Fire!" by PolitiFact. THP has also been corrected by The Associated Press, USA Today, Newsweek, and is a regular subject of Snopes.
The bio of The Halfway Post's X account reads: "Halfway true comedy and satire for your doomscrolling by @DashMacIntyre. I don't report the facts, I improve them."
We reached out to the site's creator, Dash MacIntyre, for their response to the fact that some people mistook the satirical story as real news. We will update this story if we receive a response.
The Halfway Post contained other fictitious stories based on real events or people, including one claiming that Iran offered to open the critical Straight of Hormuz if the U.S. released all the Epstein files.
Snopes has debunked similar pieces of media before. For example, in November 2025, we alerted readers to a fake story about a pro-Trump Montana town lighting a "pedophile bonfire" to burn "MAGA" merchandise.
Let us note here: Whether you agree with something being described as satire or parody is a matter of opinion. Snopes is in the business of facts. We label these rumors based on creators' description of them. Your call on whether you agree.
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