Nicholas Kaufmann is a prolific Crown Heights, Brooklyn-based horror and thriller book author. He is not an attorney defending former Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte against International Criminal Court charges of crimes against humanity.
That would be Nicholas Kaufman.
Kaufmann, the author, had never heard of Kaufman, the lawyer, until last month, when his Facebook page was flooded with new followers — mostly people with Filipino names.
“I assumed that these were fake accounts, which happens sometimes on Facebook. I just didn't pay it much attention,” he said. “But then I started to get messages from many of these followers that I didn’t understand, the messages were just saying things like ‘good luck’ and ‘God bless,' or 'bring our beloved president back home, Mr. Attorney.'”
Confused, he did some quick research into what the messages were referencing.
“That's when it hit me,” he said. “The ex-president of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte, is on trial at The Hague for crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court, and his lawyer is named Nicholas Kaufman, except his name has one N at the end instead of two Ns.”
Duterte was arrested in March following his bloody 2016-2022 presidency. He’s on trial for the thousands killed during a brutal war on drugs he waged throughout his decades-long political career.
But the people messaging Kaufmann didn’t seem to notice the extra N.
He said at one point, he was getting inundated with hundreds of messages an hour.
“DUTERTE IS INNOCENT PLEASE BRING HIM BACK FROM THE PHILIPPINES,” read one private message Kaufmann shared with Gothamist. “WE LOVE HIM . THE BEST PRESIDENT EVER.”
Some of them didn't believe me, some of them were like, ‘Oh, you can't fool us, Mr. Attorney, we know it's you.’
“Pls help tatay digong,” read another, using a nickname for DUTERTE that’s popular among his admirers. Others included “let’s go duterte” and “please bring out [sic] former president home.”
First came the messages from the pro-Duterte crowd, then more from the anti-Duterte crowd. Suddenly, the page that had functioned as a place for Kaufmann to interact with his readers became a hostile environment.
“So, I pinned a post at the top of my Facebook page saying, you know, people of the Philippines, I am not Duterte's lawyer, you've got the wrong guy, etc.," Kaufmann said. "And I thought that would handle it, but instead that gave them a place to congregate in the comments. Some of them didn't believe me, some of them were like, ‘Oh, you can't fool us, Mr. Attorney, we know it's you.’”
People even fought over the confusion, he said. One commenter apologized for the mix-up: “People from philippines just want to thank Mr. Kaufmann,” they wrote, using the spelling for the author when they presumably meant the attorney. Another chided them for wanting to reach out to the lawyer, writing “wag na kayong magkalat NG kahihiyan sa buong mundo,” which translates to “stop spreading shame all over the world.”
Eventually, Kaufmann decided to lock down his page, making it private. He said it was a difficult choice as a writer who wants to be in touch with his readership.
“I was very surprised that Duterte has so many followers, so many supporters in the Philippines, I have to admit," Kaufmann said. "I've read up a bit more about him since this began, and I've read about the charges, I've read about the things he did, and I'm very, very surprised. But at the same time, you know, maybe I shouldn't be surprised because we have our own authoritarian president right now, and he's got millions of supporters.”
Kaufmann said that even though his Facebook page is now private, people have been finding him on Instagram. "So it's possible they might just follow me around," he said.
