Fake News

Newsweek reports: Alex Jones took on a particularly insidious tone during his Monday show, accusing Mueller of violent child sex acts before dramatizing a hypothetical “wild west” shootout with Mueller, a Republican appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to lead the Russia investigation in May 2017. While playing spaghetti western music riffing off The Good, the Bad and the …

The Associated Press reports: Right-wing radio host and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is moving to dismiss a defamation lawsuit filed by the families of some of the 26 people killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting. In written arguments filed Friday, Jones’ lawyers argue he was acting as a journalist in the tradition of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein …

The Rising reports: Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) on Wednesday said he regrets his appearance on a radio show hosted by Infowars founder Alex Jones. “I would not go back on Alex Jones’ show,” Gaetz told Hill.TV co-hosts Buck Sexton and Krystal Ball on “Rising.” “Upon further reflection, I think the things that Alex Jones has said and done are so …

“Let’s take this report for what it is and say that’s accurate information. Well, I would say, thank you, Russia. How about you? Why would the documents have affected the election so much unless it exposed corruption from inside the Democrat Party and the Hillary Clinton campaign? Which it did. Now, whether you believe these indictments are real or not …

“The Pentagon developed a Atrazine-type spray that they would spray. They tested it actually in Iraq. That’s classified but it was — it got leaked. You can pull it up. Gay bomb! They always take like a clip of me going gay bomb, baby! And then I show BBC, but they cut the BBC, and it’s basically a chemical cocktail, …

Law & Crime reports: The defamation lawsuit filed in March by Aaron Rich, the brother of murdered former Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich, appears to have ramped up significantly with the subpoena of documents, communications and messages sent and received by several Twitter accounts over for the timespan of Jan. 1, 2015 to the present. In March, Aaron Rich …

Media Matters reports: After President Donald Trump falsely implied that players of the Philadelphia Eagles protested during the national anthem, Fox News aired a segment that furthered Trump’s lie. At 10:55 p.m. on June 4, Trump tweeted that a planned White House event with the Eagles was canceled, writing, “Staying in the Locker Room for the playing of our National …

The Observer reports: Conspiracy theorist and steroid snake oil salesman Alex Jones antagonized Bernie Sanders at Los Angeles International Airport, further distorting our norms over what is real and what is satire. “Well if it isn’t old Bernie Sanders,” snickered Jones in a video uploaded to the fringe website InfoWars on Monday. For eight minutes, Jones and an InfoWars host …

Little Green Footballs reports: Last February, a defamation lawsuit was filed against Holocaust denier Chuck C. Johnson, Gateway Pundit’s Jim Hoft (the fabled Stupidest Man on the Internet), far right weirdo Gavin McInnes, and a slew of other right wing bloggers and social media personalities, after they all parroted a report by Johnson that recklessly identified the wrong person as …

Alex Kaplan reports at Media Matters: An American-born man who has defended the white supremacist gathering in Charlottesville, VA, runs a website that has repeatedly spread fake news and linked to fake news websites. The site, called Jews News, was founded and is run by a man named Eliyokim Cohen, who grew up in Boston, MA, before moving to Israel. …

“On my Facebook page right now I have highlighted a documentary that concludes — and you cannot escape the reality, the diet of these children, from birth — you talk about ADD and autism. It’s a direct result, in more cases than not, I believe in the 90 plus percentile, a diet of sugars and chemicals and fake garbage that …

Jared Holt reports at Right Wing Watch: Infowars creator Alex Jones said that he was looking to hire “around 15 people, maybe even more” in order to transform Infowars into a 24-hour live television broadcast. A video uploaded this morning advertises the network’s new recruitment drive, which Jones told viewers is aimed at taking Infowars live to television for 24-hours …

“Although Plaintiffs assert that the Fox News article caused them pain, other readers might well consider their son to be a hero. Far from condemning Seth Rich for the purported leak, the Fox article portrayed him as a whistleblower who released the DNC emails to expose that ‘top party officials conspired to stop Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont from becoming …

Media Matters reports: A branch of the Russian-owned news outlet Sputnik reported as real a fake story that Israel had used a nuclear weapon on Syria from YourNewsWire, a fake news site that experts have described as a proxy and a pusher of Russian-supported narratives. On April 30, Israel launched a missile attack on facilities in Syria allegedly connected to …

NPR reports: A Danish citizen in Malaysia has pleaded guilty to maliciously publishing fake news by posting a YouTube video critical of police, making him the first person punished under the country’s new, controversial Anti-Fake News Act. Salah Salem Saleh Sulaiman, 46, is a citizen of Denmark. He posted on YouTube on April 21, after a Palestinian lecturer was shot …

The New York Daily News reports: Viral Trump-supporting sisters Diamond and Silk on Thursday lied under oath during their testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, claiming several times that they’d “never been paid by the Trump campaign.” Records from the Federal Election Commission however, suggest otherwise. According to a November 2016 receipt, the Trump campaign paid them $ 1,274.94 for …

Via Breitbart: Nine Democratic senators facing re-election in November in states President Donald Trump 18 won months ago remain silent on the nomination of Richard Grenell as U.S. Ambassador to Germany ahead of the final vote Thursday. Grenell, who is openly gay, would be, if confirmed, the highest ranking openly-gay U.S. government official ever to serve. Sens. Jon Tester (D-MT), …

The Associated Press reports: A personal finance expert launched a lawsuit against Facebook in Britain on Monday, claiming the social media company is allowing the publication of scam ads featuring his name. Martin Lewis, who founded the MoneySavingExpert website, says his name has appeared on more than 50 advertisements in the last year, many of them get-rich-quick scams to con …

Buzzfeed News reports: Sitting before the Stars and Stripes, another flag pinned to his lapel, former President Barack Obama appears to be delivering an important message about fake news — but something seems slightly…off. As the video soon reveals, the man speaking is not the former commander-in-chief, but rather Oscar-winning filmmaker Jordan Peele with a warning for viewers about trusting …

The Huffington Post reports: Alex Jones has spent years claiming the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School ― where a shooter killed 20 small children and six adults ― was faked. He has claimed the parents of these dead children are liars and “crisis actors.” Now, those parents are coming after him. In a pair of lawsuits filed late Monday, …