Tracy Morgan was the subject of a huge Twitter hoax last night and wasn’t even aware of it at the time.

Late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel decided to take to the social media network to get a little ratings boost for the Emmy Awards; trouble was, his plan involved the “30 Rock” star and a little faux drama. Minutes after he tweeted, Tracy Morgan became a trend on Twitter and thousands of viewers tuned in to watch the awards.

An estimated 25,000 tweets went out in the next few minutes about Morgan, and of course when people figured out that Kimmel was just trying to get people to change the channel, they called him out on it. But he’s one of the few people who could throw out a little fake bit of news like that and still make people laugh rather than cause outrage.