Did Harambe help Donald Trump win the election?

In the wake of yesterday’s US presidential election there’s a lot of finger pointing and blaming – and an unexpected target is Harambe, the gorilla from the Cincinnati Zoo that was shot after a child fell into his enclosure.

This is due to a quirk of the American election system when voters are allowed to “write in” candidates who aren’t officially running for the top job when they go to the polls. And thanks to a Twitter rumour suggesting between 11-15 thousand people wrote “Harambe” on their ballot papers, people are furious that this might have tipped the election in favour of Trump.

holy shit guys

1933: King Kong shot rescuing woman
1933: Adolf Hitler elected

2016: Harambe shot rescuing child
2016: Donald Trump elected

— Jess Wheeler (@wheelswordsmith) November 9, 2016

is this because of harambe

— Aus Gov Just Googled (@GovGoogles) November 9, 2016

11,000 people voted for Harambe.

— Zach Braff (@zachbraff) November 9, 2016

ABC announced that 15,000 write in votes for the President were for #Harambe this is literally a CIRCUS ELECTION

— danielxmiller (@danielxmiller) November 9, 2016

Harambe had 11,000 votes.

11,000 people voted for a dead gorilla.

Let that sink in.

— Aiden Howson (@aidenbiz) November 9, 2016

If you voted for Harambe as a joke I hope those 20 likes on Facebook were worth it

— Christine Sydelko (@csydelko) November 9, 2016

#HARAMBE had 11,000 votes. That's right 11,000 of you dumbassss actually went through with it. Congrats. #ElectionNight pic.twitter.com/KuOroaIfd9

— Catnip (@RadioCatnip) November 9, 2016

Democracy and shitty, tired old memes for the win!