US government website crashes after rumor of military draft spreads

Military Entrance Processing Station at Fort Hamilton in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. (Chris Hondros/Getty Images)

Military Entrance Processing Station at Fort Hamilton in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. (Chris Hondros/Getty Images)

The website for the Selective Service System crashed Friday morning because of the “spread of misinformation.”

The agency responsible for maintaining information on those eligible to be drafted apparently crashed shortly after Gen. Qassem Soleimani, head of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, was killed in a drone strike Thursday evening.

According to CNN, the event sparked concern on social media that a draft would return if Iran and the U.S. entered a conflict.

The Selective Service System assured people on Twitter that if the draft were necessary, it would require both Congress and presidential approval.

The website was still running slowly Friday afternoon according to The Washington Examiner. Searches for "Selective Service" and "U.S. Draft" reportedly spiked following the drone strike.

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