Garden City, Kan.—Brandon Lynn has had a little extra pep in his step the past few days.
Ever since the 35-year-old learned of a nationwide effort to encourage him with an oft-repeated phrase, “Let’s go, Brandon.”
“At first, I thought it was a negative thing, like telling me to hurry up. Like my ex-wife, who was always ridin’ my ass: ‘What happened to your pants, Brandon?’ ‘Why’d you spend Christmas weekend in the basement playing video games, Brandon?’ ‘Why do you keep letting raccoons in the house, Brandon?’,” he said. “But then it turned out to be a good thing. You know, positive.”
Lynn, who works part-time at a medical device museum and occasionally mows his neighbor’s lawn for 10 bucks a pop, appeared unaware of the phrase’s origin and meaning. The term began as a mishearing of a vulgar chant at a NASCAR event. Some in the crowd chanted “[expletive deleted] Joe Biden” but one reporter erroneously thought the crowd was urging on driver Brandon Brown with, “Let’s go, Brandon.”
It is believed to be the first misheard presidential insult since 1962, when at a meeting of southern Democrats, a chant of “Beat Jack Kennedy” was misinterpreted as “Eat yak any day.” This led to a brief boom in yak farming which quickly collapsed due to yak meat’s stringiness.
“I don’t watch NASCAR, and I’m not much for politics. Why do you ask?” Lynn said.
The first time he heard the phrase was at work.
“Me and [co-worker] Joe [Wills] were unloading an iron lung off the back of a semi when the driver says, ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ to Joe and they both laughed. I thought they were razzin’ me but I didn’t say nothin’ because Joe’s in good with the owner’s family and I wanted to keep the job since they fired me from being a bubble gum taste tester on account of me saying everything was too tangy,” Lynn said. “And Joe’s kind of a jerk. One time he talked me into sitting in the Bergonic Chair, which he told me was a massage chair. Turns out it was a deal they’d use to run a jolt of electricity through shell shocked soldiers. Man, it was way worse that the time I accidentally swallowed that spark plug.”
Wills, a confirmed mean bastard, encouraged Lynn to start a Twitter account and thank all of his followers. It did not go as Wills had envisioned.
“I was just havin’ a little fun with him. He’s not the sharpest guy, but he fell for it. He goes on there and thanks everyone for all the encouragement, but then a whole bunch of people started following him. Like, really important people like Mark Ruffalo and that crazy-haired socialist that ran for president,” Wills said. “Even the hot girl from the burrito place stopped by the museum and said she wanted to meet him.”
After 12 hours online, Lynn had garnered 2.3 million Twitter followers, starred in four viral Tik Tok videos, received a book offer from Simon and Schuster, and was named the Democratic National Committee’s Senior Advisor for Rural Affairs.
He’ll meet with President Biden at the White House next week.
“I’m gonna quit the job at the museum, but not before I thank Joe for the Twitter idea. He’s not such a…wait, that’s my phone. Oh, it’s Netflix again. They wanna do one of them documentaries about me, but I already said ‘yes’ to HBO,” Lynn said.