RICHMOND, VIRGINIA: Chaturbate, an online adult chat room, which is owned by Multi Media, LLC, has been garnering immense public attention after it was revealed that a Virginia Democratic candidate Susanna Gibson used the platform to perform raunchy acts in exchange for "Tips."
Founded in 2011, the platform says that it is named for "the act of masturbating while chatting online." The gender-specific categories on the site are free to watch but viewers have to pay to join a private show.
As of April 2022, Chaturbate was the 57th most popular website in the world and the fifth most popular pornographic site.
Gibson, who is running in a competitive race to represent District 57 in Richmond, allegedly hosted more than a dozen live romps with her husband, John David Gibson, on the platform.
The 40-year-old nurse practitioner’s sex actors were then posted to a publicly accessible archive on the website Recurbate in September 2022 after she declared her candidacy, the Washington Post reported.
The videos are no longer active on Recurbate but can be found on other publicly available sites.
Gibson had over 5,770 Chaturbate subscribers, to whom she continuously pushed for additional "tokens" in return for certain acts in "private" showings.
What did Susanna Gibson say in her raunchy videos?
Gibson allegedly worked under the identity of ‘Hot Wife Experience’ on Chaturbate, which is a legal website where viewers can watch live webcam performances that feature nudity and sexual activity.
Gibson's pornographic content was first reported by the Washington Post after receiving a tip from a Republican insider.
In one of her videos, the mother of two is seen asking viewers for 'tips' to request specific sex acts - in violation of Chaturbate's terms and conditions, which say, "Requesting or demanding specific acts for tips may result in a ban from the Platform for all parties involved."
In another video, Gibson also suggested that she and her husband have “tried swapping” with different partners as she is “ethically non-monogamous,” even though John 'doesn't like sharing.'
"Yeah I f*** random strangers if you're hot," she said, adding 'We have tried swapping. I was telling them earlier about ethical non-monogamy. We uh, he doesn't like sharing.'
"Racking up one token left and right, anymore? I'm raising money for a really good cause," she says at one point, according to Daily Mail. However, it's unclear if she meant she was raising money for her campaign.
How did Susanna Gibson react to her scandal explosion?
In a statement to the Post, Gibson reacted to her scandal explosion, saying that the exposure of her videos is "an illegal invasion of my privacy designed to humiliate me and my family."
“It won’t intimidate me and it won’t silence me,” Gibson said, adding “My political opponents and their Republican allies have proven they’re willing to commit a sex crime to attack me and my family because there’s no line they won’t cross to silence women when they speak up.”
Daniel P Watkins, Gibson’s attorney, told the outlet that the archived videos breached Virginia's revenge porn legislation, which makes it a Class 1 misdemeanor to “maliciously” circulate sexual images or another person’s nudity with “intent to coerce, harass, or intimidate.”
The attorney highlighted a 2021 ruling by the Virginia Appeals Court that stated it was unlawful for a man to surreptitiously film his girlfriend during consensual sexual contact, even if the footage was never shown to anyone else.
“We are working closely with state and federal law enforcement,” Watkins added.
