Fact Check: Yes, Roseanne Barr Told Students to 'Drop Out of College' at Mar-a-Lago Fundraiser. Here's What Else She Said

Claim:

At a GOP fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago in April 2024, Roseanne Bar urged students to "drop out of college."

Rating:

In a clip posted to the X (formerly Twitter) account PatriotTakes on April 4, 2024, comedian Roseanne Barr reportedly urged college students to drop out.

This claim was true.

While at Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., on April 3, the outspoken comedian was there to support the fundraising efforts of non-incumbent U.S. Senate candidate, Arizona's Kari Lake.

Addressing the camera while holding what appeared to be a glass of white wine and wearing a black headscarf and beaded jewelry over a flowing black dress, Barr delivered the following message to students:

At the time of this writing, the clip received 2.3 million views and was also shared across countless other social media accounts, furthering its viral reach, with many dismissing Barr with memes and GIFs about her appearance, or wisecracks about their own college experience. "I really miss the good old days when I was in college … devil worshipping and going to parties. You know it was going to be a good week when you could get in a little baby blood drinking as well!!" one commenter quipped.

Some also wrote to express their disregard for the former sitcom star due to her apparent allegiance to QAnon, the political conspiracy theory that alleges a secret plot against Trump by a supposed "deep state" cabal of Satan-worshiping ped*ph*les. Barr had previously expressed support for QAnon on her X account.

However, some people in the comments section did agree with parts of her take on the college experience, albeit not necessarily the blood-drinking part. "She ain't wrong for the college thing, it's a scam," wrote one, while another responded, "College nowadays is a total sham Peter Theil got it right to skip out and start a business instead."

According to multiple reports, Barr dropped out of school at age 17, around the time she was hit by a car, resulting in a traumatic brain injury that saw her hospitalized at a Utah mental health facility for many months.

At the Mar-a-Lago fundraising event, Barr joined former news-anchor-turned-Senate-candidate Lake and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Trump to raise funds for Lake's campaign in Arizona. Throughout the evening, attendees contributed to the cause, ultimately raising $1 million in donations, campaign officials told ABC News, with tickets to the event starting at $1,000 per person.

Perhaps best known for her role in the titular ABC sitcom "Roseanne," Barr has also been active in politics. In 2012, she sought the Green Party's presidential nomination, later receiving votes from the left-wing Peace and Freedom Party. Following Trump's presidential candidacy announcement, in 2016 Barr expressed her support for him, telling The Hollywood Reporter, "I think we would be so lucky if Trump won. Because then it wouldn't be Hillary [Clinton]," and, "I like Trump because he financed his own [campaign]. That's the only way he could've gotten that nomination. Because nobody wants a president who isn't from Yale and Harvard and in the club."

Following the revival of her sitcom "Roseanne" in 2018, Barr faced backlash for an apparently racially charged tweet about Valerie Jarrett, a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama, leading to the cancellation of her show. Despite claiming her tweet was political rather than racist, ABC swiftly removed her from the series, which was subsequently rebranded as "The Conners" without her.

Snopes has previously reported on other controversies involving Barr, including the time the comedian, who is Jewish, posed as Adolf Hitler for a photo shoot.

Sources:

Deb, Sopan. "Roseanne Barr's Tweets Didn't Come Out of Nowhere." The New York Times, 29 May 2018. NYTimes.com, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/29/arts/television/twitter-posts-roseanne-barr.html.

"Https://Twitter.Com/Patriottakes/Status/1775881678910583009." X (Formerly Twitter), https://twitter.com/patriottakes/status/1775881678910583009. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.

News, A. B. C. "Trump-Backed Senate Candidate Kari Lake Raises over $1M at Mar-a-Lago Fundraiser: Sources." ABC News, https://abcnews.go.com/US/trump-backed-senate-candidate-kari-lake-raises-1m/story?id=108768584. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.

Peace and Freedom 2012 – 2012 Election Campaign of the California Peace and Freedom Party. https://www.peaceandfreedom2012.org/. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.

Roseanne Barr | Biography, TV Series, & Facts | Britannica. 7 Mar. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Roseanne-Barr.

"Roseanne Barr - Biography." IMDb, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001683/bio/. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.

Ross, Tracy. "Roseanne Barr on Trump 'Playing the Heel for Hillary,' Pot and Being a Farmer." The Hollywood Reporter, 7 June 2016, https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/roseanne-barr-us-would-be-900413/.

Twitter, et al. "Roseanne Barr Is Running for President as a Green Party Candidate." Los Angeles Times, 3 Feb. 2012, https://www.latimes.com/archives/blogs/ministry-of-gossip/story/2012-02-02/roseanne-barr-is-running-for-president-as-a-green-party-candidate.

"What Happened to Roseanne Barr: When Traumatic Struggles, Heady Success and a History of Saying Anything Met Twitter." E! Online, 31 May 2018, https://www.eonline.com/news/940162/what-happened-to-roseanne-barr-when-traumatic-struggles-heady-success-and-a-history-of-saying-anything-met-twitter.