Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ Infowars media platform and its assets will be sold off in auctions this fall to help pay the more than $1 billion he owes relatives of victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ Infowars media platform and its assets will be sold off piece by piece in auctions this fall to help pay the more than $1 billion he owes relatives of victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, under an order expected to be approved by a federal judge.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Lopez in Houston said during a court hearing Tuesday that he will approve the auctions that start in November. But he said he first must change a previous order to make it clear that the trustee overseeing Jones’ personal bankruptcy case controls all the assets of Infowars parent company Free Speech Systems, which is owned 100% by Jones.

Despite the pending loss of his company, Jones vows to continue his talk shows through other means, possibly including a new website and his personal social media accounts. He also has suggested that Infowars’ assets could be bought by his supporters, allowing him to continue hosting his show as an employee under the Infowars brand in their home city of Austin, Texas.

  • brutalbeard@lemmy.world
    2·
    2 days ago

    How’s this? Buy it, build voice and image models from the many hours of footage you now own, about a “persona” and then use that to spread mis-misinformation. Like an ai version of the Alex Jones character explaining that climate change is caused by humans, and other true things

    PS: he argued somewhere along the way about the character he plays isn’t him, he doesn’t think that the sandy hook families are lying blah blah… I just play an evil bastard on tv

  • mPony@lemmy.world
    433·
    3 days ago

    Why has this taken THIS LONG to get this far? Anybody else would have been rendered penniless within a year, tops.

    • aidan@lemmy.world
      21·
      3 days ago

      Anybody else would have been rendered penniless within a year, tops.

      Nobody else has ever been ordered to pay that much, much less in a suit for speech. Wrongful death lawsuits are awarded less than this.

    • johannesvanderwhales@lemmy.world
      191·
      3 days ago

      Most people don’t have multimillion dollars in assets with complex ownership schemes. But I also would challenge the assumption that it would ever go quickly. The legal system is very, very slow.

  • Snapz@lemmy.world
    483·
    3 days ago

    “We’re going to auction off this poison, so then other people will own that poison. The new owner will be the type of person very motivated to spend a significant amount of money on poison.”

    I get that the money is needed for restitution, but some things just need to be encased in concrete and blasted into the earth’s core. They need to go get Disney’s IP lawyers so that they can keep the brand alive forever, only to never be used again by anyone.

    • Catma@lemmy.world
      2·
      3 days ago

      Look i just need Dan and Jordan to get the desk and maybe that skull he had on the desk for a while. After that it can all burn but those guys deserve those things for all they do in putting together Knowledge Fight.

    • bookcrawler@lemmy.world
      5·
      3 days ago

      If I had the money I’d want to try staffing it with cult deprogramming specialists. It would be an interesting experiment to track.

    • explodicle@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      11·
      3 days ago

      I’m kinda tempted to buy something for the lulz. I used to like Jones a long time ago, and the proceeds will go towards Sandy Hook victims anyways.

  • ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world
    43·
    3 days ago

    I have a terrible feeling, that Elon Musk will buy it, then hire Alex Jones as its host, with the condition it needs to be exclusive to Xitter.

    • CasualPenguin@reddthat.com
      15·
      3 days ago

      Musk wasting money to support fellow inhumane people is a given, if what you said happens the only delta with normalcy is the victims of alt-right trash finally will get compensated

    • pyre@lemmy.world
      3·
      2 days ago

      that’s as good as dead. tucker carlson was the most influential host on fox news. went to twitter. he’s literally irrelevant now. no one watches twitter, it’s not a thing.

    • FlowVoid@lemmy.worldEnglish
      191·
      3 days ago

      Not sure how you did that, the judgment against Alex Jones was in 2022.

      Then they had to decide whether Jones could work off his debt or whether he would be forced to sell off his company. The families offered to go with an annual payment, Jones started haggling over the amount, and this year the families said forget it and went with liquidation.

  • MehBlah@lemmy.world
    29·
    3 days ago

    I hope the domain gets sold to someone who puts up a site dedicated to ridiculing all the losers who have been there.

    • TotesIllegit@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      3 days ago

      Personally, I think redirecting to Knowledge Fights’ site would be a good move; though I mostly hope it doesn’t wind up under ownership of some other grifter.