Rep. Jamie Raskin made a dumb joke about his headwear on Tuesday at a House Democratic Caucus meeting. A reporter heard Raskin and tweeted about it. The original tweet was somewhat misleading and a follow-up tweet was published. By that time the original tweet had caught the attention of social media users.

Raskin is battling lymphoma and undergoing chemotherapy. He is losing his hair, a common side effect of chemo. So, he wore a bandana headcover on Tuesday. He received a standing ovation from other Democrats in the room. Another Democrat asked Raskin what he would do if Republicans insisted he takes the headcover off on the House floor. Because, you know, Republicans are bad people or something.

What Raskin joked about never happened. He was answering a hypothetical question with a lame joke.

In a Tuesday tweet, Punchbowl News reporter Heather Caygle wrote that Raskin had received a standing ovation in a House Democratic Caucus meeting after saying he’d push back on Republican efforts to make him remove his headwear. “And I will make them take off their toupees,” Caygle quoted Raskin as saying.

Jacob Wilson, a spokesperson for Raskin, told the AP in an email that Raskin “was responding lightheartedly to a hypothetical question from a colleague” at the caucus meeting. According to Caygle’s tweet, he was asked: “what he would do if Republicans made him take off his headwear on the House floor.”

Caygle clarified in a follow-up tweet that Raskin said no House Republicans have spoken to him about hat rules. Caygle declined further comment when reached by email. Wilson said the Democrat “has received nothing but support and encouragement from all of his colleagues and leaders on both sides of the aisle.”

Mark Bednar, a spokesperson for McCarthy, said the House speaker had not told Raskin to remove his head covering.

In 1837, hats were banned on the House floor. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) who is Muslim and wears a headscarf, fought to loosen the hat rules toward religious headdresses in 2018. Republicans never asked Raskin to remove his headwear. They have been very supportive of Raskin since he announced his diagnosis just as his fellow Democrats have been.

Much ado about nothing. A joke fueled a false rumor. Nonetheless, the reporter’s tweets received a lot of responses on Twitter.

“If there was ever any doubt about how scummy House Republicans are, they want Rep. Jamie Raskin to remove the cap he’s been wearing while he undergoes chemo treatment for CANCER,” wrote one Twitter user, in a post that had been liked nearly 30,000 times by Wednesday.

“Kevin McCarthy has insisted Jamie Raskin remove the headscarf he is wearing because chemotherapy has caused his hair to fall out,” wrote another user, in a tweet with 34,000 likes, referring to the Republican House speaker. “You would think they would have compassion for a colleague with cancer but they are monsters.”

House Republicans are scummy monsters. Got it. I wonder if AP would have fact-checked the joke gone bad if the tables were turned and a Republican had joked about the hat rules and slammed Democrats.

AP rated the claim as false. Rankin’s Republican colleagues have been nothing but supportive, as they should be for him.