145-607: InfoWars is an American far-right conspiracy theory and fake news website created by Alex Jones . It was founded in 1999, and operated under Free Speech Systems LLC. Talk shows and other content for the site were created primarily in studios at an undisclosed location in an industrial area in the outskirts of Austin, Texas . Reports in 2017 stated that the InfoWars website received approximately 10 million monthly visits, making its reach greater than some mainstream news websites such as The Economist and Newsweek at
290-477: A source by snowball clause consensus in 2018, determining that InfoWars is a "conspiracy theorist and fake news website ". Beginning in September 2018, Jones and InfoWars were both suspended from Twitter and Periscope , a Twitter subsidiary. This followed Jones tweeting a Periscope video calling on others "to get their battle rifles ready against antifa, the mainstream media, and Chicom operatives". In
435-480: A "Top 10 Worst Anti-Science Websites" list. InfoWars advocated New World Order conspiracy theories , 9/11 conspiracy theories , the chemtrail conspiracy theory , conspiracy theories involving Bill Gates , supposed covert government weather control programs, claims of rampant domestic false flag operations by the US Government (including 9/11), and the unsupported claim that millions voted illegally in
580-500: A "high schooler". New York Magazine's Olivia Nuzzi later corroborated the quote. Cernovich was interviewed on Foreign Policy's podcast in relation to his anti-McMaster campaign, and discussed the tension between journalism and activism. On October 12, 2017, Buzzfeed revealed the existence of the "Shitty Media Men" spreadsheet, which had been created a day earlier in the aftermath of the Harvey Weinstein scandal , and
725-654: A Luciferian agenda", and claimed that U.S. healthcare was under the control of a "Jewish mafia". In February 2018, Jones was accused by two former employees of antisemitism , anti-black racism and sexual harassment of both male and female staff members. He denied the allegations. Two former employees filed complaints against Jones with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission . On July 27, 2018, Facebook suspended Alex Jones's official page for thirty days, claiming Jones had participated in hate speech against Robert Mueller . This
870-474: A bestseller in the motivational self-help category on Amazon . In 2016, Cernovich published Danger & Play: Essays on Embracing Masculinity . In October 2016, he published MAGA Mindset: Making YOU and America Great Again through Castalia House, a Finnish publishing house founded by Vox Day which primarily publishes science fiction and fantasy. In 2016, Cernovich was an associate producer for Cassie Jaye 's documentary The Red Pill , which discusses
1015-732: A bounty for information supporting the conspiracy theory that murdered DNC staffer Seth Rich had been behind a leak of emails from the Democratic National Committee . In April 2017, Cernovich promoted a conspiracy theory that the Khan Shaykhun chemical attack in Syria was a hoax funded by an American financier. Cernovich commissioned artist Ben Garrison to draw an antisemitic cartoon portraying Generals H.R. McMaster and David Petraeus being controlled by Jewish puppetmasters - specifically George Soros and
1160-450: A constantly rotating platter of targets." Writer and activist Soraya Chemaly called Gamergate a "breeding ground and practice ground" for the 2016 campaign. In December 2017, Cernovich published a Medium post and contacted several journalists and news outlets about a joke tweet that comedian and MSNBC contributor Sam Seder had written in 2009. Cernovich claimed that the tweet, which read "Don't care re Polanski, but I hope if my daughter
1305-422: A contest to create the best "CNN Meme", for which the winner would receive $ 20,000. They were responding to CNN reporting on a Reddit user who had created a pro-Trump, anti-CNN meme. In June 2017, it was announced that Roger Stone , a former campaign advisor for Donald Trump, would be hosting his own InfoWars show "five nights a week", with an extra studio being built to accommodate his show. In March 2018,
1450-400: A cut of GCN's advertising, and it did not sell its own advertising time. By 2017, the show had ceased promoting its video service (though it still existed), and InfoWars did not make any documentary films after 2012; virtually all of its revenue was being generated by selling Jones's dietary supplements to viewers and listeners through the site's online store. In 2017, the supplements sold on
1595-412: A demonic force that was on the verge of total control, requiring their urgent efforts to stop it. Therefore, they rejected pluralistic politics, with its compromise and consensus-building. Hofstadter thought that these characteristics were always present in a large minority of the population. Frequent waves of status displacement would continually bring it to the surface. D. J. Mulloy, however, noted that
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#17327878051331740-458: A failure by several media outlets. In 2014, Cernovich became a prominent figure of Gamergate , which targeted feminists as part of a nascent culture war in the aftermath of the MeToo movement . He encouraged the doxing of opponents, and wrote about women attacking men with false rape allegations. Wired Magazine wrote that Cernovich "gained a kind of leadership over the unruly mob", and that
1885-598: A federal lawsuit against Jones, which led to a settlement on confidential terms in May 2017. Jones offered an apology and retraction, admitting he had made "certain statements" on InfoWars "that I now understand to be wrong". In 2019, Jerome Corsi and InfoWars apologized and retracted a story promoting conspiracy theories about the murder of Seth Rich . The retraction was published on the front page of InfoWars, where Corsi said that "his allegations were not based upon any independent factual knowledge." Corsi said that he retracted
2030-487: A group of alt-right celebrities who believed they could become a major influence on the Republican Party. In 2018, Cernovich became "increasingly critical" of Trump, and less politically active. In September 2018, he tweeted his disappointment, "There's no Wall . She's not locked up . But Flynn got fired and sent to wolves. And Saudi Arabia sold weapons of murder. I give zero f-cks about Republicans losing
2175-506: A larger ban of far-right extremists. The ban covered videos, audio clips, and articles from InfoWars , but excluded criticism of InfoWars . Facebook indicated it would take down groups that violated the ban. The InfoWars app was pulled from Google Play on March 27, 2020, for violating its policies on spreading "misleading or harmful disinformation", after Jones opposed efforts to contain COVID-19 and said "natural antivirals" could treat
2320-461: A left-wing attack that was highly critical of American capitalists. By 1932 he had millions of regular listeners. He supported Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 and promoted the early New Deal . He broke with Roosevelt in 1935 on foreign policy. Coughlin then denounced the New Deal , which he claimed had accomplished little but instead had strengthened the position of the bankers. In 1934 he set up
2465-450: A legal process. Cernovich publicized his claims in a Medium.com article, in tweets, and on Periscope live streams. The hashtag #SusanRice became a trending topic on Twitter; he later posted a screenshot showing the tweets received 400,000 impressions. Cernovich claimed that his sources were sympathetic employees of mainstream media outlets, whose outlets were "sitting on this story". The next day, Bloomberg News published its story on
2610-456: A letter to Jones in February 2017 demanding a retraction or apology. (Such a letter is required before a party may seek punitive damages in an action for libel under Texas law ). After receiving the letter, Jones said, "I want our viewers and listeners to know that we regret any negative impact our commentaries may have had on Mr. Alefantis, Comet Ping Pong, or its employees. We apologize to
2755-431: A libertarian perspective. Shortly after his divorce in 2011, he created the blog Danger & Play , where he wrote about men's rights , fitness, and self-help topics. The title of Danger & Play came from a quote by Friedrich Nietzsche : "The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything." In an October 2016 blog post, Cernovich wrote that date rape
2900-505: A local chapter and collected initiation fees, while the national office sold expensive white robes with masks. The organizers collected the money and moved on, leaving locals with weak leadership. Once the state leaders were exposed as frauds in the mid-1920s, the KKK collapsed rapidly. Organizers promised membership would be secret, and appealed to Anti-Catholicism as well as hostility to Jews and African Americans. Protestant fundamentalists were
3045-445: A lower commitment to democracy, instead having loyalty to groups, institutions and systems. However, some scholars reject Lipset and Raab's analysis. James Aho, for example, says that the way individuals join right-wing groups is no different from how they join other types of groups. They are influenced by recruiters and join because they believe the goals promoted by the group are of value to them and find personal value in belonging to
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#17327878051333190-600: A more militant approach to countering these perceived threats. A book written by Klaus Wah in the year 2000, The Radical Right , contrasts the radical right of the 1950s, which obtained influence during the Reagan administration, to the radical right of today, which has increasingly turned to violent acts beginning with the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. Wahl's book documents this evolution: "Ideologies of [today's] radical right emphasize social and economic threats in
3335-711: A motion to unseal evidence and depositions from Giuffre's lawsuit. He told Politico he was "astonished" by the amount of redactions the judge allowed, with some documents "largely or entirely redacted". Alan Dershowitz later filed a similar motion, and the Miami Herald filed a third in April 2018. The motions were denied by the trial court, and Cernovich and the Herald appealed to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The Reporters Committee for Freedom of
3480-737: A number of major brands in the U.S. suspended their ads from InfoWars ' s YouTube channels, after CNN notified them that their ads were running adjacent to InfoWars content. In July 2018, YouTube removed four of InfoWars ' s uploaded videos that violated its policy against hate speech and suspended posts for 90 days. Facebook also banned Jones after it determined four videos on his pages violated its community standards in July 2018. In August 2018, YouTube, Apple and Facebook removed content from Jones and InfoWars , citing their policies against hate speech and harassment. In an October 2018 Simmons Research survey of 38 news organizations, InfoWars
3625-490: A portion of their recovery to increase the overall value", which it claimed brought its bid close to $ 7 million. The gun control advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety was to have an "exclusive" advertising deal upon the relaunch. Jones responded to the sale in a live stream on X (formerly Twitter) , stating that it was "a distinct honor to be here in defiance of the tyrants", and that "I don't know what's going to happen, but I'm going to be here until they come in there and turn
3770-642: A potential run. Cernovich's high prominence in pro-Trump social media circles led him to build a network of sympathetic sources, and break several stories on his blog, which he promoted on Twitter and video streaming sites like Periscope . The New Yorker's Andrew Marantz described it as "hardly journalism in its highest form. But it's not exactly fake news, either", comparing it to the Huffington Post's citizen journalism tactics. New York Magazine's Jesse Singal deemed it gonzo journalism , while CNN's Tom Kludt said Cernovich "gained prominence in
3915-568: A prominent figure in the Gamergate harassment campaign against several women in the video game industry, and through this built a following among the alt-right . During the 2016 presidential campaign , he adapted his website to a political blog. He was an early supporter of Republican candidate Donald Trump , and promoted conspiracy theories about Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton . Since 2018, he has become increasingly critical of Trump, and in 2022 voiced support for Ron DeSantis instead for
4060-400: A propaganda pipeline that "[takes] advantage of the media ecosystem architecture", in which "destructive memes" that emerge from the media's periphery (social media and sites like Infowars) can spread to its core, as mainstream media covers the controversies. Politico has described Cernovich as an "avid consumer and progenitor of conspiracy theories". During the 2016 campaign, Cernovich
4205-696: A reaction among Americans, who were alarmed by the levels of crime and welfare dependency among the new arrivals, and the danger of political power in the hands of the Pope. This led to the organized Nativists and xenophobes . Nativists in New York formed the American Republican Party . It merged into the Know Nothings in the 1850s. The Know-Nothing activists and Irish Catholics fought a series of election-day confrontations especially in
4350-645: A result, observers could only estimate its revenue and profits. Prior to 2013, Jones focused on building a "media empire". By 2013, Alex Seitz-Wald of Salon estimated that Jones was earning as much as $ 10 million a year between subscriptions, web and radio advertising, and sales of DVDs, T-shirts, and other merchandise. That year, Jones changed his business model to incorporate selling proprietary dietary supplements, including one that promised to "supercharge" cognitive functions. Unlike most talk radio shows, InfoWars itself did not directly generate income, as it did not receive syndication fees from its syndicator GCN nor
4495-498: A ruthless prosecution of the ideological war along lines very similar to those it finds in the Communist enemy". He also quotes Barry Goldwater : "I would suggest that we analyze and copy the strategy of the enemy; theirs has worked and ours has not". American historian Rick Perlstein argues that radical right issues, including populism , nativism , and authoritarianism—embodied by conspiracy-minded right-wing movements, such as
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4640-616: A significant proportion of other white Americans. Throughout modern history , conspiracism has been a major feature of the radical right and subject to numerous books and articles, the most famous of which is Richard Hofstadter's essay The Paranoid Style in American Politics (1964). Imaginary threats have variously been identified as originating from American Catholics , non-whites , women , homosexuals , secular humanists , Mormons , Jews , Muslims , Hindus , Buddhists , American communists , Freemasons , bankers , and
4785-421: A single phenomenon. Daniel Bell argues that the ideology of the radical right is "its readiness to jettison constitutional processes and to suspend liberties, to condone Communist methods in the fighting of Communism". Historian Richard Hofstadter agrees that communist-style methods are often emulated: "The John Birch Society emulates Communist cells and quasi-secret operation through 'front' groups, and preaches
4930-407: A story that can hurt Hillary, I want it in the news cycle". He set out to coin and promote hashtags that would promote these stories, and aimed to get the stories covered by conservative news aggregator The Drudge Report, saying: "If it's on Drudge, then it's on Hannity. If it's on Hannity, then Brian Stelter's talking about it on CNN". Researchers from Oxford said in a 2020 book that it exemplifies
5075-472: A timetable; on his radio show, Jones had said that he expects InfoWars to operate for a few more months, or to be sold to another party that may retain him as an employee. Murray also asked the bankruptcy court to put a hold on the Sandy Hook families' attempts to collect their settlements from Jones, saying that their efforts would interfere with the liquidation; much of its proceeds would ultimately go to
5220-478: Is " fake news " and "utterly corrupt", sentiments which blur the line between established news organizations and activists, and lead conservatives to downplay or excuse fake news published by "their side". Singal described conservatives as believing "[people like Cernovich] are on the right side , and they're set to overtake those corrupt dinosaurs who have controlled the flow of information for far too long". In an interview with Vice News , Cernovich claimed he
5365-525: Is "liberal fiction" that is "harmful ... for men and women" and leads to false rape accusations, claiming that: "Lying about being in love to sleep with someone isn't rape [...] Getting played isn't rape. Regret isn't rape. Thinking, 'I might have been date raped,' means you weren't raped." His comments received sustained criticism. In 2015, Cernovich self-published Gorilla Mindset: How to Control Your Thoughts and Emotions, Improve Your Health and Fitness, Make More Money and Live Life on Your Terms , which became
5510-480: Is European in origin, has been adopted by some American social scientists. Since the European right-wing groups in existence immediately following the war had roots in fascism they were normally called "neo-fascist". However, as new right-wing groups emerged with no connection to historical fascism, the use of the term "right-wing extremism" came to be more widely used. Jeffrey Kaplan and Leonard Weinberg argued that
5655-578: Is an overarching belief in the existence of New World Order intent on instituting a one-world, communist government. Climate change being viewed as a hoax is also sometimes associated with the radical right. Since 2017, the QAnon conspiracy theory has been widely promulgated among fringe groups on the far-right. During the COVID-19 pandemic , far-right leaders and influencers have promoted anti-vaccination rhetoric and conspiracy theories surrounding
5800-594: Is commonly, but not exclusively used to describe anticommunist organizations such as the Christian Crusade and the John Birch Society ... [T]he term far right ... is the label most broadly used by scholars ... to describe militant white supremacists ." The study of the radical right began in the 1950s as social scientists attempted to explain McCarthyism , which was seen as a lapse from
5945-457: Is designed to prevent circumventing a ban. In May 2019, President Donald Trump tweeted or retweeted defenses of people associated with InfoWars , including editor Paul Joseph Watson and host Alex Jones, after the Facebook ban. Jones's accounts have also been removed from Pinterest , Mailchimp , LinkedIn , and Instagram . The Misplaced Pages community deprecated and blacklisted InfoWars as
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6090-433: Is disagreement in the past over how right-wing political movement should be described, and no consensus over what the proper terminology should be exists, although the terminology which was developed in the 1950s, based on the use of the words "radical" or "extremist", is the most commonly used one. Other scholars simply prefer to call them "The Right" or " conservatives ", which is what they call themselves. The terminology
6235-409: Is ever raped it is by an older truly talented man w/a great sense of mise en scene," proved Seder tacitly endorsed Roman Polanski's sexual abuse crime . MSNBC elected to sever ties with Seder by not renewing his contract (due to expire in February 2018) due to the controversial tweet. Seder defended the tweet by pointing out that, taken in context of the current events around the time he posted it, it
6380-467: Is not always the case. The main core belief is inequality, which often takes the form of opposition to immigration or racism. They do not see this new Right as having any connection with the historic Right, which had been concerned with protecting the status quo . They also see the cooperation of the American and European forms, and their mutual influence on each other, as evidence of their existence as
6525-552: Is used to describe a broad range of movements. The term "radical right" was coined by Seymour Martin Lipset and it was also included in a book titled The New American Right , which was published in 1955. The contributors to that book identified a conservative "responsible Right" as represented by the Republican administration of Dwight D. Eisenhower and a radical right that wished to change political and social life. Further to
6670-502: The Drudge Report website, Rudy Giuliani , and Donald Trump. In September 2016, Clinton was filmed collapsing from pneumonia after a memorial service, and Cernovich started the #HillarysHealth hashtag, which trended nationwide; that month, Cernovich's tweets were seen more than 100 million times. In November 2016, Cernovich and other conspiracists promoted the baseless Pizzagate conspiracy theory , which misinterpreted
6815-566: The 1856 , with multiple injuries and a few deaths. The Know Nothing party split over the issue of slavery and its northern wing merged into the Republican Party in the late 1850s. Starting in the 1870s and continuing through the late 19th century, numerous white supremacist paramilitary groups operated in the South , with the goal of intimidating African-American supporters of the Republican Party . Examples of such groups included
6960-572: The 9/11 attack and Sandy Hook shooting ). InfoWars issued retractions various times as a result of legal challenges. Jones has had contentious material removed, and has also been suspended and banned from many platforms for violating their terms of service , including Facebook , Twitter , YouTube , iTunes , and Roku . InfoWars earned most of its revenue from direct sales of products pitched by Jones, which initially consisted of videos and later included survivalist products and branded merchandise, but shifted primarily to dietary supplements by
7105-622: The BBC , and The New York Times which Salon said were "dwarfed" by those from RT. A 2020 study by researchers from Northeastern , Harvard , Northwestern and Rutgers universities found that InfoWars was among the top 5 most shared fake news domains in tweets related to COVID-19, the others being The Gateway Pundit , WorldNetDaily , Judicial Watch and Natural News . InfoWars regularly claimed, without evidence, that mass shootings were staged "false flag" operations, and accused survivors of such events of being crisis actors employed by
7250-594: The Black Legion , Charles Coughlin , the Christian Front , and " birther " speculation — have had more influence on mainstream conservatism than William F. Buckley 's libertarian ideas of limited government , free trade and free market economics ; or neoconservative ideas like pro-immigration and empire-building. The American Patriots who spearheaded the American Revolution in
7395-521: The Democratic party ), based on sympathizers as well as active supporters of the " Proud Boys , Oath Keepers , QAnon etc.". He points to survey data of Republicans who answered "yes" to questions such as whether they had a "favorable opinion of the people who invaded the Capitol on Jan. 6 ", thought it likely that Donald Trump would "be reinstated as president before the end of 2021", and whether it
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#17327878051337540-558: The InfoWars store were primarily sourced from Dr. Edward F. Group III, a chiropractor who founded the Global Healing Center supplement vendor. A significant portion of InfoWars ' s products contain colloidal silver , which Jones falsely claimed "kills every virus", including "the whole SARS - corona family"; this claim was disputed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). A lesser source of revenue for InfoWars
7685-466: The John Birch Society in the United States, and since then it has been applied to similar groups worldwide. The term "radical" was applied to the groups because they sought to make fundamental (hence " radical ") changes within institutions and remove persons and institutions that threatened their values or economic interests from political life. Among academics and social scientists there
7830-691: The Red Shirts and the White League . In the Midwestern United States in 1887, the American Protective Association (APA) was formed by Irish Protestants from Canada who wanted to fight against the political power of Irish Catholic politicians. It was a secret organization with vastly exaggerated membership claims whose members campaigned for Protestant candidates in local elections and it opposed
7975-652: The Rothschild Family . Garrison was disinvited from an event at the White House in 2019 following complaints about the cartoon from the Anti-Defamation League . Cernovich began hosting the fourth hour once a week on conspiracy theorist Alex Jones ' InfoWars show in May 2017. During the 2021 effort to recall incumbent California governor Gavin Newsom , Cernovich floated
8120-613: The U.S. government . Alexander Zaitchik , writing for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), credited cable news hosts, including Glenn Beck , Lou Dobbs , the John Birch Society , and WorldNetDaily with popularizing conspiracy theories. In the Fall 2010 issue of the SPLC's Intelligence Report , he identified the following as the top 10 conspiracy theories of the radical right: Common to most of these theories
8265-582: The United States government . InfoWars host Alex Jones promoted the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting conspiracy theories , claiming that the massacre of twenty elementary school students and six staff members was "completely fake" and "manufactured," a stance for which Jones was heavily criticized. In March 2018, six families of victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting , as well as an FBI agent who responded to
8410-480: The new right and some have described him as part of the alt-lite . Cernovich became a blogger in the 2000s, focusing on anti-feminist themes. He gained notice within the manosphere , and made a number of inflammatory comments about dating and sexual assault, including the claim that date rape is "liberal fiction". He created a website, Danger and Play , in 2011; it was first known for his postings about men's rights and mindset techniques. In 2014, Cernovich became
8555-422: The politics of the United States , the radical right is a political preference that leans towards ultraconservatism , white nationalism , white supremacy , or other far-right ideologies in a hierarchical structure which is paired with conspiratorial rhetoric alongside traditionalist and reactionary aspirations. The term was first used by social scientists in the 1950s regarding small groups such as
8700-554: The "National Union for Social Justice", as a network of local clubs he would control. The National Union never flourished and it closed in 1936. Instead he endorsed the left-wing presidential campaign of William Lemke , who campaigned on the Union Party ticket, as a new third party. Lemke was also supported by Gerald L. K. Smith , head of the remnants of the Share Our Wealth movement and Dr. Francis Townsend , head of
8845-459: The "new right" was "more of a populist movement than a conservative or liberal movement", and that "conservatism is on the way out". During the 2016 United States presidential campaign , Cernovich saw Donald Trump as a kindred spirit and, according to Politico , during the 2016 campaign and early period of the Trump administration, Cernovich was an "indefatigable Trump cheerleader" and was among
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#17327878051338990-490: The 1770s were motivated primarily by an ideology that historians call Republicanism . It stressed the dangers of aristocracy , as represented by the British government, corruption, and the need for every citizen to display civic virtue. When public affairs took a bad turn, Republicans were inclined to identify a conspiracy of evil forces as the cause. Against this background of fear of conspiracies against American liberties
9135-437: The 2016 US presidential election. Jones frequently used InfoWars to assert that mass shootings are conspiracies or "false flag" operations; these false claims are often subsequently spread by other fake news outlets and on social media. This has been characterized as Second Amendment "fan fiction". Infowars has published and promoted fake news , and Jones has been accused of knowingly misleading people to make money . In
9280-642: The 2024 election. Cernovich has promoted fake news , conspiracy theories, and smear campaigns. He helped spread the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which falsely claimed that John Podesta and other high-ranking Democratic Party officials were involved in a child-sex ring. Cernovich has frequently made unsubstantiated accusations about political opponents of being pedophiles. He unearthed old tweets by Sam Seder and James Gunn joking about pedophilia, and initially succeeded in pressuring to get them fired, but both were reinstated after public outcry. Cernovich
9425-632: The American political tradition. A framework for description was developed primarily in Richard Hofstadter 's "The pseudo-conservative revolt" and Seymour Martin Lipset 's "The sources of the radical right". These essays, along with others by Daniel Bell , Talcott Parsons , Peter Viereck and Herbert Hyman , were included in The New American Right (1955). In 1963, following the rise of the John Birch Society,
9570-430: The American radical right have stressed American exceptionalism. The U.S. studies have paid attention to the consequences of slavery, the profusion of religious denominations and a history of immigration, and saw fascism as uniquely European. Although the term "radical right" was American in origin, the term has been consciously adopted by some European social scientists. Conversely the term "right-wing extremism", which
9715-585: The Clintons, he saw as evidence the couple were involved in child trafficking. In another YouTube video, he said that most people employed by the news media and "every A-list actor" in Hollywood were also pedophiles. Cernovich has also supported the unevidenced theory that there were multiple shooters at the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting , which he claims the government is covering up. In 2016, Cernovich worked with Chuck Johnson and Wikileaks to offer
9860-580: The FDA ordered InfoWars to discontinue the sale of a number of products marketed as remedies for COVID-19 in violation of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act , including toothpaste, liquids, and gels containing colloidal silver . In 2017, Haaretz reported that InfoWars had accused Israel of involvement in the 9/11 attacks, accused the Rothschilds of promoting "endless war, debt slavery and
10005-568: The Global Tetrahedron offer was better for Jones's other creditors because Sandy Hook families would partially forgo payments, but this made the offer difficult to precisely valuate. Full terms of the offer were not publicly disclosed. Jones's lawyers said that Murray acted improperly in accepting the offer, saying that the two offers were difficult to directly compare. Additionally, Lopez indicated that he had expected bidders to be able to counterbid, although his September order gave Murray
10150-523: The House." Also in 2018, Cernovich criticized the Trump administration's missile strikes against Syria , which divided the president's political base. Following the 2022 midterm elections , Cernovich said the losses meant that "at least no one has to suck up to Trump anymore", and that "Trump has zero shot at 2024". He voiced his support for Ron DeSantis for the 2024 election. During the 2016 campaign, Cernovich told journalist Andrew Marantz: "if there's
10295-755: The Klan in 1924. During the Great Depression in the United States there were several popular new movements. On the left the largest by far was Huey Long 's Share Our Wealth , which attacked capitalism and was expanding from its base in Louisiana when Long was assassinated. On the right the most important was Father Coughlin . Charles Coughlin (Father Coughlin) was a Catholic priest who immigrated from Canada to Detroit and began broadcasting on religious matters in 1926. When his program went national in 1930, he began to comment on political issues, promoting
10440-714: The Press (which includes the Associated Press ) filed an amicus brief to support the appeal. In July 2019, the Court of Appeals ordered the documents unsealed. In February 2020, Cernovich filed a third-party motion in Roger Stone's criminal case, calling for the release of the jury foreperson's questionnaire answers. This motion too was supported by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. It
10585-544: The Republican Party's political strategy. Critics on the Left denied that McCarthyism could be interpreted as a mass movement and rejected the comparison with 19th-century populism. Others saw status politics, dispossession and other explanations as too vague. Two different approaches were taken by these social scientists. The American historian Richard Hofstadter wrote an analysis in his influential 1964 essay The Paranoid Style in American Politics . Hofstadter sought to identify
10730-505: The Trump-era for legitimate national security related scoops". On April 2, 2017, Cernovich broke the news that Susan Rice , Obama 's national security advisor, had requested the unmasking of several Trump transition officials who appeared in intelligence reports. When electronic eavesdropping of foreign officials incidentally capture American citizens' names, those names are redacted in intelligence reports, but can be "unmasked" through
10875-672: The accusers were paid a settlement by Congress's Office of Compliance in exchange for a confidentiality agreement. Cernovich then gave the documents to BuzzFeed , saying he did not publish them on his own because he thought Democrats would attempt to discredit him. BuzzFeed verified that the documents were real, and published their article on November 20, 2017. The House Ethics Committee launched an investigation; other allegations followed, and Conyers resigned in December 2017. New York Magazine's Jesse Singal said Cernovich benefited from common conservative sentiments that mainstream journalism
11020-471: The alt-right was a "big-tent" that included "any conservative or reactionary who was [...] too belligerently antiestablishment to feel at home in the Republican Party ". In November 2016, white nationalist Richard B. Spencer , who also self-identified as alt-right, became its "indelible face" after a video of him giving a Nazi salute provoked universal outrage. This led to a rift in the alt-right movement between white nationalists and civic nationalists , with
11165-585: The attack, filed a defamation lawsuit against Jones for his role in spreading conspiracy theories about the shooting. In December 2019, InfoWars and Jones were ordered to pay $ 100,000 in legal fees prior to the trial for another defamation lawsuit from a different family whose son was killed in the shooting. In a June 2022 agreement, the families agreed to drop their Texas and Connecticut defamation cases against Infowars, Prison Planet TV and IW Health, and in return, those companies would no longer pursue their Texas case for bankruptcy protection. The agreement did not end
11310-493: The auction, with the site afterwards shut down, to be relaunched in January 2025 as a satire written by Onion staff. CEO Ben Collins stated that the new site would be "very funny" and "very stupid", and cited Bluesky users who suggested that it would be funny for The Onion to acquire InfoWars . Global Tetrahedron had offered $ 1.75 million in cash, plus credit from families of the Sandy Hook shootings who had "agreed to forgo
11455-415: The authority to conduct a sealed-bid auction at Murray's sole discretion. Jones's lawyers said that Murray had scheduled a public bid period but abruptly canceled it after the initial sealed bids had been submitted. The original website was restored on the morning of November 15 by Jones, who told viewers that Murray had improperly shut it down before the sale was finalized, and posted on X the next day that
11600-573: The authors were asked to re-examine their earlier essays and the revised essays were published in the book The Radical Right . Lipset, along with Earl Raab, traced the history of the radical right in The Politics of Unreason (1970). The central arguments of The Radical Right provoked criticism. Some on the Right thought that McCarthyism could be explained as a rational reaction to communism. Others thought McCarthyism should be explained as part of
11745-623: The ball, there were clashes between Trump supporters and protesters. In 2015 and 2016, Cernovich repeatedly made false claims that white South Africans were being genocided, which were debunked by Genocide Watch . He later deleted the tweets. Politico described him in 2016 as wanting an IQ test requirement for immigrants and to end federal funding for universities. Interviewed on 60 Minutes in March 2017, Cernovich supported single-payer healthcare . Cernovich has supported "some sort of universal basic income ", and suggested in 2018 that
11890-525: The characteristics of the groups. Hofstadter defined politically paranoid individuals as feeling persecuted, fearing conspiracy, and acting over-aggressive yet socialized . Hofstadter and other scholars in the 1950s argued that the major left-wing movement of the 1890s, the Populists, showed what Hofstadter said was "paranoid delusions of conspiracy by the Money Power". Historians have also applied
12035-546: The claims, the pizza business was targeted by phone threats, vandalism, and harassment, which the co-owners called "alarming, disappointing, disconcerting and scary". In 2017, InfoWars (along with similar sites) published a fake story about U.S. yogurt manufacturer Chobani , with headlines including "Idaho yogurt maker caught importing migrant rapists" and "allegations that Chobani's practice of hiring refugees brought crime and tuberculosis to Twin Falls ". Chobani ultimately filed
12180-591: The country against both foreign and domestic radicals. Fear of immigration led to a riot in New York City in 1806 between nativists and Irishmen, which led to increased calls by Federalists to nativism. In America, public outrage against privilege and aristocracy in the United States was expressed in the Northeast by advocates of anti-Masonry , the belief that Freemasonry comprised powerful evil secret elites which rejected republican values and were blocking
12325-497: The damages awarded against Jones in defamation suits) was estimated as being between $ 1 million to $ 10 million. On June 23, 2024, Jones' court-appointed bankruptcy trustee Christopher Murray filed an "emergency" motion in a Houston court indicating his intention to shut down InfoWars . According to the motion, Murray made plans to "conduct an orderly wind-down" of the operations of Free Speech Systems, InfoWars’ parent company, and also "liquidate its inventory", but he did not announce
12470-630: The disease. In March 2023, the Southern Poverty Law Center reported on Jones' leaked texts from his Sandy Hook defamation trial. The texts revealed that Jones and his collaborators had been trying to evade social media bans of InfoWars content by setting up alternate websites such as National File to disguise its origin. In April 2022, it became known the company behind InfoWars had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, as had Infowars Health (or IWHealth), against further civil litigation lawsuits. The court filings estimated InfoWars assets at between $ 0–$ 50,000, but its liabilities (including from
12615-440: The elites because immigrants brought socialism and radicalism, while for the masses the threat came from their Catholicism. The main elements are low democratic restraint, having more of a stake in the past than the present and laissez-faire economics. The emphasis is on preserving social rather than economic status. The main population attracted are lower-educated, lower-income and lower-occupational strata. They were seen as having
12760-466: The extent our commentaries could be construed as negative statements about Mr. Alefantis or Comet Ping Pong, and we hope that anyone else involved in commenting on Pizzagate will do the same thing." InfoWars also issued a correction on its website. InfoWars reporter Owen Shroyer also targeted East Side Pies, a group of pizza restaurants in Austin, Texas, with similar fake "Pizzagate" claims. Following
12905-485: The families, Murray said. On September 24, bankruptcy judge Christopher Lopez approved the liquidation of InfoWars ' and Free Speech Systems' assets. Auctions would be held on November 13 and December 10; no limits were to be imposed on who may bid for the company's intellectual property and other assets. On November 14, Global Tetrahedron—publisher of the satirical newspaper The Onion —announced that it had bought InfoWars ' intellectual property assets in
13050-531: The first Radical Right-style responses came in the 1790s. Some Federalists warned of an organized conspiracy involving Thomas Jefferson and his followers, and recent arrivals from Europe, alleging that they were agents of the French revolutionary agenda of violent radicalism, social equalitarianism and anti-Christian infidelity. The Federalists in 1798 acted by passing the Alien and Sedition Acts , designed to protect
13195-415: The first stage certain groups came under strain because of a loss or threatened loss of power and/or status. In the second stage they theorize about what has led to this threat. In the third stage they identify people and groups whom they consider to be responsible. A successful radical right-wing group would be able to combine the anxieties of both elites and masses. European immigration for example threatened
13340-441: The former branding the latter " cuckservatives " and "alt-lite". Following the schism, Cernovich disassociated himself from alt-right, saying: "The first order of business is getting that Nazi shit way the fuck away from me". He adopted the label "new right", and has also described himself as an economic nationalist . Cernovich was one of the organizers of the January 2017 DeploraBall inaugural ball to celebrate Trump's victory;
13485-417: The group. Several scholars, including Sara Diamond and Chip Berlet , reject the theory that membership in the radical right is driven by emotionality and irrationality and see them as similar to other political movements. John George and Laird Wilcox see the psychological claims in Lipset and Raab's approach as "dehumanizing" of members of the radical right. They claim that the same description of members of
13630-689: The hashtag drew conspiracy theorists from across the political spectrum, whose common link was their "profound distrust of the mainstream media". The rumors later inspired a gun-wielding man to visit Comet Ping Pong . Cernovich, who had used the hashtag 60 times, later deleted the tweets, and downplayed his involvement in propagating the theory. Cernovich regularly asserts, without evidence, that there are active child sex rings in Washington, D.C. and in Hollywood. He has accused his opponents of being pedophiles on many occasions. A visit to Haiti by
13775-622: The hiring of Catholics for government jobs. The movement relied on forged documents and was rejected by mainstream Republicans. Anti-Catholicism was declining in America as the Catholics moved up the social ladder, and the APA quickly faded away in the mid-1890s. The Second Ku Klux Klan , was formed in 1915 but grew very slowly until the early 1920s. Then entrepreneurs took it over as a cash machine whereby well-paid state and local organizers formed
13920-520: The intelligence unmasking. The White House falsely claimed it was a "smoking gun" that supported its past allegations that Obama had "illegally wiretapped" Trump Tower, though the Susan Rice story was tangential to those claims. Trump himself, conservative commentators Tucker Carlson and David French , White House conselor Kellyanne Conway , and congressmen Rand Paul and Devin Nunes all promoted
14065-492: The late 2010s. Jones also staged direct-donation telethons called "money bombs" although InfoWars was not a nonprofit organization . On July 30, 2022, amidst a $ 150 million lawsuit brought against Jones and InfoWars by Sandy Hook families, Free Speech Systems filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection . On September 24, 2024, a Houston bankruptcy judge ordered the liquidation of InfoWars and Free Speech Systems at two auctions to be held later that year. On November 14, it
14210-415: The leaked Podesta emails to imply that high-ranking Democrats were involved in a child sex-trafficking ring. He also claimed that a 1997 video of Marina Abramovic's " spirit cooking " performance art constituted "occult symbolism" to "openly taunt the public", and that it proved that Clinton's inner circle was part of a sex cult. He helped #Pizzagate become one of the biggest trending hashtags on Twitter;
14355-454: The left-wing Townsend Old Age movement. In the election, however, Lemke received fewer than 900,000 votes. Mike Cernovich Michael Cernovich (born November 17, 1977) is an American right-wing social media personality , political commentator, and conspiracy theorist . Though he initially called himself alt-right , he dissociated from the movement after Richard Spencer became its public face. Cernovich describes himself as part of
14500-404: The lights off. I'm going to say, 'where's your court order?'" Hours after Global Tetrahedron's announcement, Jones's lawyers said that the auction had been conducted improperly, and Judge Lopez put a hold on the sale pending a hearing to be held the following week. Murray also received a $ 3.5 million cash offer from Jones-affiliated First United American Companies; although its cash value was less,
14645-518: The main recruits, along with poorly educated men. The Klan organizers claimed that Catholics were controlled by the Pope. They supported prohibition and public schools. The Klan was anti-elitist and it also attacked "the intellectuals", seeing itself as the egalitarian defender of the common man. The Klan was denounced by the Republicans, but the Democrats split bitterly on a proposal to denounce
14790-525: The men's rights movement, and issues like male suicide, child custody, and educational inequality. In 2018, Cernovich produced a documentary called Hoaxed: Everything They Told You Is a Lie , with associate producers Scooter Downey and Jon Du Toit. The Hollywood Reporter described it as "a right-wing take on corporate malfeasance and media bias". The movie interviewed a wide range of conservative figures, including Anthony Scaramucci , Jordan Peterson , Scott Adams , James O'Keefe , and Alex Jones . Hoaxed
14935-510: The modern and postmodern world (e.g., globalization, immigration). The radical right also promises protection against such threats by an emphatic ethnic construction of 'we', the people, as a familiar, homogeneous in-group, anti-modern, or reactionary structures of family, society, an authoritarian state, nationalism , the discrimination, or exclusion of immigrants and other minorities ... While favoring traditional social and cultural structures (traditional family and gender roles, religion , etc.)
15080-583: The movement had more to do with identity than with gaming or women. Cernovich hired private investigators to hound Zoë Quinn , a central target of Gamergate, and worked with Eron Gjoni, Quinn's former boyfriend who had written the disparaging blog post about Quinn which incited the harassment campaign. According to O'Toole et al. writing in Gender Violence , "Cernovich's ongoing strategy, even after Gamergate itself died down, has been to promote conspiracy theories, provide dubious legal advice, and offer
15225-540: The movement toward egalitarianism and reform. The anti-Masons, with a strong evangelical base, organized into a political party, the Anti-Masonic Party that pledged to rid Masons from public office. It was most active in 1828–1836. The Freemason movement was badly damaged and never fully recovered; the Anti-Mason movement merged into the coalition that became the new Whig Party . The anti-Masonry movement
15370-515: The name was a reference to Hillary Clinton's earlier " basket of deplorables " comment. He banned fellow organizer Baked Alaska after the latter made an antisemitic tweet, and banned Spencer after he discovered the latter had bought a ticket. Notable attendees of the DeploraBall include Martin Shkreli , James O'Keefe , and Cassandra Fairbanks ; Peter Thiel also briefly appeared. Outside
15515-467: The names, but held back the rest after consulting his lawyer. New York Magazine denounced Cernovich's actions as a weaponization of the allegations in order to "attack the hated liberal media". The list itself later led to a string of investigations, resignations and firings. In November 2017, Cernovich uncovered sworn affidavits in which former staffers accused Democratic congressman John Conyers of sexual harassment . The documents also revealed that
15660-524: The pandemic . From the 1990s onward, parties that have been described as radical right became established in the legislatures of various democracies including Canada , Australia , Norway , France , Israel , Russia , Romania , and Chile , and they also entered coalition governments in Switzerland , Finland , Austria , the Netherlands , and Italy . However, there is little consensus about
15805-549: The paranoid category to other political movements, such as the conservative Constitutional Union Party of 1860. Hofstadter's approach was later applied to the rise of new right-wing groups, including the Christian right and the Patriot movement . Political scientist Gary Jacobson gives an estimate of the "size of the extremist vote" as a fraction of Republican Party voters (there being essentially no right-wing extremists in
15950-555: The platform was overturned by Elon Musk in December 2023, after the latter's acquisition of the site and subsequent rebranding as X . On September 7, 2018, the InfoWars app was removed from the Apple App Store . On September 20, 2018, PayPal informed InfoWars they would cease processing payments in ten days because "promotion of hate and discrimination runs counter to our core value of inclusion." On May 2, 2019, Facebook and Instagram banned Jones and InfoWars as part of
16095-632: The radical right in the U.S. and right-wing populism in Europe were the same phenomenon that existed throughout the Western world. They identified the core attributes as contained in extremism, behaviour and beliefs. As extremists, they see no moral ambiguity and demonize the enemy, sometimes connecting them to conspiracy theories such as the New World Order. Given this worldview, there is a tendency to use methods outside democratic norms, although this
16240-468: The radical right is also true of many people within the political mainstream. Richard Hofstadter found a common thread in the radical right, from fear of the Illuminati in the late 18th century, to anti-Catholic and anti-Masonic movements in the 19th to McCarthyism and the John Birch Society in the 20th. They were conspiracist , Manichean, absolutist and paranoid. They saw history as a conspiracy by
16385-578: The radical right uses modern technologies and it does not ascribe to a specific economic policy; some parties advocate a liberal, free-market policy, but other parties advocate a welfare state policy. Finally, the radical right can be scaled by using different degrees of militancy and aggressiveness from right-wing populism to racism , terrorism , and totalitarianism ." Ultraright groups, as The Radical Right definition states, are normally called " far-right " groups, but they may also be called "radical right" groups. According to Clive Webb, "Radical right
16530-929: The reasons for this. Some of these parties had historic roots, such as the National Alliance , formed as the Italian Social Movement in 1946, the French National Front , founded in 1972, and the Freedom Party of Austria , an existing party that moved sharply to the right after 1986. Typically new right-wing parties, such as the French Poujadists , the U.S. Reform Party and the Dutch Pim Fortuyn List enjoyed short-lived prominence. The main support for these parties comes from both
16675-462: The right of the radical right, they identified themselves as the "ultraright", adherents of which advocated drastic change, but they only used violence against the state in extreme cases. In the decades since, the ultraright, while adopting the basic ideology of the 1950s radical right, has updated it to encompass what it sees as "threats" posed by the modern world . It has leveraged fear of those threats to draw new adherents, and to encourage support of
16820-505: The sale "never happened". On November 18, Jones sued Murray and some Sandy Hook families, accusing them of colluding to arrange the acceptance of a "flagrantly non-compliant Frankenstein bid" and asking the judge to halt the sale. InfoWars disseminated multiple conspiracy theories, including false claims against the HPV vaccine and claims the 2017 Las Vegas shooting was part of a conspiracy. In 2015, skeptic Brian Dunning listed it at #4 on
16965-495: The same segment, VICE noted that only 32% of Americans trusted the press, and interviewed Eugene Yi of the MIT Media Lab , who showed that mainstream journalists had practically no reach among conservative Twitter users. In 2015, Virginia Giuffre sued Ghislaine Maxwell , alleging that Maxwell sexually trafficked her for Jeffrey Epstein while she was a minor. Maxwell settled the suit In January 2017, Cernovich filed
17110-541: The self-employed and skilled and unskilled labor, with support coming predominantly from males. However, scholars are divided on whether these parties are radical right, since they differ from the groups described in earlier studies of the radical right. They are more often described as populist. Studies of the radical right in the United States and right-wing populism in Europe have tended to be conducted independently, with very few comparisons made. European analyses have tended to use comparisons with fascism, while studies of
17255-573: The separate defamation cases against Alex Jones and Free Speech Systems. Jones also accused David Hogg and other survivors of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting of being crisis actors . InfoWars promoted fabricated Pizzagate claims. The fake claims led to harassment of the owner and employees of Comet Ping Pong , a Washington, D.C. pizzeria targeted by the conspiracy theories, including threatening phone calls, online harassment, and death threats . The owner sent
17400-498: The story because it relied on information that The Washington Times had retracted, but still thought that investigators should look into whether Seth Rich played a role. While Jones stated, "I'm not a business guy, I'm a revolutionary", he spent much of InfoWars ' s air time pitching dietary supplements and survivalist products to his audience. As a private firm, InfoWars and its affiliated limited liability companies were not required to make public financial statements; as
17545-490: The story. Donald Trump Jr. claimed Cernovich deserved a Pulitzer Prize . The story was criticized as a distraction from the Russia probe investigating Trump. The New Yorker 's Ryan Lizza said there were "valid reasons" for concerns about unmasking, but that it was constrained by a legal process and independent review, and noted there was no evidence of misconduct. Experts and bipartisan congresspeople concluded Susan Rice
17690-533: The summer of 2015, video editor Josh Owens and reporter Joe Biggs took a video of workers loading cargo in Texas. They claimed the men were drug smugglers; the Drudge Report picked up their headline, and Donald Trump used it in a campaign speech. Owens admitted years later: "It's not about truth, it's not about accuracy — it's about what's going to make people click on this video...In essence, we lied." (Biggs
17835-589: The term "extremist" is often applied to groups outside the political mainstream and the term is dropped once these groups obtain respectability, using the Palestinian Liberation Organization as an example. The mainstream frequently ignores the commonality between itself and so-called extremist organizations. Also, the radical right appeals to views that are held by the mainstream: antielitism, individualism, and egalitarianism. Their views on religion, race, Americanism and guns are held by
17980-418: The time. The site regularly published fake stories linked to harassment of victims. In February 2018, Jones, the publisher, director and owner of InfoWars , was accused of discrimination and sexual harassment of employees. InfoWars , and in particular Jones, advocated numerous conspiracy theories, particularly around purported domestic false flag operations by the U.S. government (which they allege include
18125-523: The video he also stated, "Now is time to act on the enemy before they do a false flag." Twitter cited this as the reason to suspend his account for a week on August 14. On September 6, Twitter permanently banned InfoWars and temporarily banned Alex Jones for repeated violations of the site's terms and conditions. Twitter cited abusive behavior, namely a video that "shows Jones shouting at and berating CNN journalist Oliver Darcy for some 10 minutes during congressional hearings about social media." Jones's ban from
18270-526: The website was promoted by bots connected to the Russian government . A 2017 study by the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University found that InfoWars was the 13th most shared source by supporters of Donald Trump on Twitter during the election. In 2016, Paul Joseph Watson was hired as editor-at-large . In February 2017, political commentator Jerome Corsi
18415-412: The website's policies. Apple removed all podcasts associated with Jones from its iTunes platform and its podcast app. On August 13, Vimeo removed all Jones's videos because they "violated our terms of service prohibitions on discriminatory and hateful content". By February 2019, a total of 89 pages associated with InfoWars or Alex Jones had been removed from Facebook due to its recidivism policy, which
18560-534: Was "among the first" to spread rumors about Hillary Clinton 's health. Clinton had previously experienced a brain concussion and blood clots, but testing found "complete resolution", and her doctors attested to her good health. In March 2016, he claimed that a photo of Hillary Clinton winking showed she had experienced a "mild stroke". In August, he promoted the hashtags: #CoughingHillary and #SickHillary on Twitter, and spread rumors that Clinton had epilepsy and Parkinson's disease . These rumors were amplified by
18705-431: Was "definitely true" that "top Democrats are involved in elite child sex-trafficking rings ." Based on the results, which were stable over 2020–2022, he estimated that "20 to 25 percent of the Republican electorate can be considered extremists". Sociologists Lipset and Raab were focused on who joined these movements and how they evolved. They saw the development of radical right-wing groups as occurring in three stages. In
18850-645: Was "doing her job", that there was "absolutely" no smoking gun in the unmasked reports, and that the unmaskings were "neither unusual nor against the law". In 2017, Cernovich launched a sustained campaign to influence Trump to fire his national security advisor, H. R. McMaster , claiming that McMaster was undermining the president's America First agenda. He started the McMasterLeaks.com website to document his and others' criticisms of McMaster. On May 8, 2017, Cernovich reported that McMaster had called White House director of strategic communications Hope Hicks
18995-525: Was a satiric response to a petition urging Polanski's release from detention in Switzerland because of his stature as an artist, and that he had been mocking Polanski's apologists. After news of the termination broke, Cernovich released a video on Twitter video celebrating his triumph. By then, Seder noted that advertisers on The Majority Report with Sam Seder podcast were also being contacted and pressured by Cernovich and his followers to cut ties with
19140-532: Was also made into a book of the same name. The documentary was listed on the Amazon platform before being removed without comment in 2020. Cernovich's writings turned political after Trump announced his candidacy for the 2016 U.S. presidential election . He became notable for his trolling ; his maxims were "conflict is attention", and "attention is influence". He identified himself as alt-right , and joined forces with provocateurs like Milo Yiannopoulos . Early on,
19285-409: Was announced that Global Tetrahedron—publishers of the news satire publication The Onion —had acquired the assets of InfoWars , with plans to temporarily shut it down and relaunch it in 2025 as a satirical news website ; however, the original website was restored by Jones the next day after his lawyers alleged irregularities in the auction, and the bankruptcy judge put the sale on hold. InfoWars
19430-514: Was born on November 17, 1977, in the farming town of Kewanee, Illinois . His family was poor, and his parents were both devout Christians. Cernovich graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy from the University of Illinois at Springfield in 2001. He graduated with a Juris Doctor from Pepperdine University School of Law in 2004. In 2004, Cernovich started a legal blog entitled Crime & Federalism , where he wrote about law from
19575-512: Was created in 1999 by American conspiracy theorist Alex Jones . Founded by Jones with his then-wife Kelly, it was originally a mail-order outlet for the conspiracy-oriented videos produced by the Joneses. InfoWars features The Alex Jones Show on their broadcasts and was established as a public-access television program aired in Austin, Texas in 1999. During the 2016 presidential election ,
19720-415: Was filling a "vacuum" created by conservative distrust of mainstream media. The people who are going to watch [this interview] on VICE , or on HBO, are not my people. So you guys could create this caricature of a madman and a monster, and maybe two or three people who follow me on Twitter would even watch it. So we live now in parallel structures. Right now there's no shared set of facts in the country. In
19865-472: Was hired as Washington bureau chief, after InfoWars was granted a White House day pass. In June 2018, Corsi's connection to InfoWars ended; he received six months of severance payments. In May 2017, Mike Cernovich joined the InfoWars team as a scheduled guest host for The Alex Jones Show , with CNN reporting the "elevation to InfoWars host represents the meteoric rise in his profile". On July 6, 2017, alongside Paul Joseph Watson, Jones began hosting
20010-638: Was its "money bomb" telethons , which resembled public radio fundraisers, except InfoWars was a for-profit institution. According to former InfoWars employees, a money bomb could raise $ 100,000 in a day. In 2014, Jones claimed that InfoWars was accumulating over $ 20 million in annual revenue. The New York Times attributed most of the revenue to sales of supplements, including "Super Male Vitality" and "Brain Force Plus", which InfoWars purported would increase testosterone and mental agility, respectively. Court documents in 2014 indicate that InfoWars
20155-512: Was later backed by Roger Stone, who filed a motion for a new trial, which was denied. Cernovich became influential on social media, initially as part of the manosphere movement. Cernovich calls his adversaries "beta males", losers, or " cucks ", saying: "to beat a person, you lower his or her social status". Cernovich uses trolling tactics, which he says he uses to build his brand rather than for his own amusement. In December 2017, Cernovich hosted an "Ask Me Anything" on Reddit , regarded as
20300-792: Was later indicted for seditious conspiracy for his role with the Proud Boys in the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol .) As part of the probe by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections , InfoWars was investigated to see if it was complicit in the dissemination of fake news stories distributed by Russian bots. From May 2014 to November 2017, InfoWars republished articles from multiple sources without permission , including over 1,000 from Russian state-sponsored news network RT , as well as stories from news outlets such as CNN ,
20445-456: Was not "radical"; it fully participated in democracy, and was animated by the belief that the Masons were the ones subverting democracy in America. While earlier accounts of the antimasons portrayed their supporters as mainly poor people, more recent scholarship has shown that they were largely middle-class. The arrival of large numbers of Irish Catholic immigrants in the 1830s and 1840s led to
20590-409: Was ranked the second least trusted news organization by Americans, with The Daily Caller being lower-ranked. On March 12, 2020, Attorney General of New York Letitia James issued a cease and desist letter to Jones concerning InfoWars ' s sale of unapproved products that the website falsely asserted to be government-approved treatments for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). On April 9,
20735-832: Was successful enough for Jones and his then-wife to be planning to "build a swimming pool complex ... featuring a waterfall and dining cabana with a stone fireplace". The documents also listed Jones's possessions, including four Rolex watches, a $ 40,000 saltwater aquarium, a $ 70,000 grand piano, $ 50,000 in weapons, and $ 70,000 in jewelry. After InfoWars was banned by Facebook, YouTube, Apple, Spotify, and Pinterest, Jones appealed to viewers, "The enemy wants to cut off our funding to destroy us. If you don't fund us, we'll be shut down." Radical right (United States) Defunct Newspapers Journals TV channels Websites Other Economics Gun rights Identity politics Nativist Religion Watchdog groups Youth/student groups Miscellaneous Other In
20880-465: Was swiftly followed by action from other bodies—on August 6, Facebook, Apple , YouTube and Spotify all removed content by Alex Jones and InfoWars from their platforms for violating their policies. YouTube removed channels associated with Infowars , including The Alex Jones Channel, which had gained 2.4 million subscriptions prior to its removal. On Facebook, four pages associated with InfoWars and Alex Jones were removed due to repeated violations of
21025-493: Was used by female journalists to crowdsource allegations ranging from "weird lunch dates" to rape and stalking committed by their male coworkers. The list included reporters from The New York Times , The Wall Street Journal , The New Yorker , and Buzzfeed. On October 16, Cernovich offered to pay $ 10,000 for a copy of the list. He obtained it on October 21, claiming the source "was insistent on not accepting anything", and announced his intent to release it; he published two of
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