Vanity Fair was found to have featured images of Sam Brinton, a non-binary former Biden administration senior Department of Energy official, wearing dresses a female designer says were stolen from her.
This latest controversy emerged after Asya Khamsin, a Tanzanian fashion designer, accused Brinton of stealing her luggage full of custom-made dresses in an airport in 2018.
Brinton, facing various theft charges for stealing luggage in airports across America, was released without bail last week. He was removed from the Biden administration over the incidents last year.
In the wake of the designer's allegation, an eagle-eyed Twitter user spotted an old Vanity Fair article featuring Brinton in one of Khamsin's dress.
NONBINARY BIDEN NUCLEAR OFFICIAL CHARGED WITH STEALING WOMAN'S LUGGAGE AT AIRPORT’
After Gov. Ron DeSantis spokeswoman Christina Pushaw posted Khamsin's photos of her dresses and Brinton wearing them (tweeting, "'Cultural appropriation' … is stunning and brave as long as you are ~non binary~"), one Twitter user responded with a screenshot of the Vanity Fair article.
"OMG. Vanity Fair did a fashion article on Sam Brinton featuring him in one of the stolen dresses. [laughing emojis]," the account tweeted.
The Vanity Fair article, published in the Italian version of the magazine on February 21, 2022, was titled "All the style of Sam Brinton." It showed the bureaucrat wearing Khamsin's dresses at a Trevor Project event in 2018, the same year she said her dresses were taken.
NONBINARY BIDEN OFFICIAL SAM BRINTON ACCUSED OF GRAND LARCENY AMID SEPARATE THEFT CHARGES
Khamsin told Fox News Digital Wednesday she recently saw a report that Brinton had been charged with stealing multiple pieces of luggage across the country and noticed that the former official appeared to be wearing her clothes in several photos. Khamsin said she had packed the same clothes in a bag that vanished on March 9, 2018, at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
"I saw the images. Those were my custom designs, which were lost in that bag in 2018," she said. "He wore my clothes, which was stolen."
The DOE announced on Dec. 12 that Brinton had departed the agency but wouldn't comment on the reason for the departure after he was charged in Minnesota and Nevada. A spokesperson for the DOE said the agency wasn't allowed to comment on personnel matters
