Obama Once Scolded Steph Curry For Saying That The Moon Landing Was Fake

NBA powerhouse Steph Curry shared in a new Rolling Stone profile that his friend Barack Obama sent him a “stern” email after he casually shared that he thought the moon landing was faked ― an old but persistent conspiracy theory among fringe science-deniers. 

The scolding came after the Golden State Warriors star made the shocking comment on the podcast “Winging It” in 2018, saying “I don’t think so” after asking others on the episode whether they thought the moon landing was real. “Sorry, I don’t want to start any conspiracies,” he continued.

Outrage rained down on Curry, usually one of the NBA’s most admired players. But it was the former president’s reaction that spurred him to undo any damage he’d done, Curry said in Monday’s profile. 

“That night, I got an email,” he said of the 2018 incident. “It was a pretty stern, direct one from President Obama” telling him that the first moon landing in 1969, like all those that followed it, was unequivocally real. “You’ve got to do something about this,” Curry recalled Obama telling him. 

The NBA star responded by hosting a 15-minute conversation with Scott Kelly, a retired Navy captain and astronaut, for his 23 million followers on Instagram and partnering with the performance-wear company Under Armour to design a pair of sneakers emblazoned with craters and the American flag, which he wore during a game before auctioning them off to support STEM programs in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Kelly was among those who had called out the Warriors star, tweeting at him: “Steph, so much respect for you, but regarding the moon landing thing, let’s talk.”

While the moon landing conspiracy theory has largely fallen out of favor with conspiracy theorists, other anti-science claims about vaccines and climate change are thriving among conservative groups, posing immediate threats to human survival. 

In the Rolling Stone profile, Curry explained that he’d been shown a video promoting the conspiracy theory while attending a Christian high school ― a lesson intended “to arm us for defending our faith as we went into the world,” he said.