How fitting that last month’s news that the Onion had bought Alex Jones’s unhinged, conspiracy-peddling media operation, Infowars, in a bankruptcy auction turned out to be inaccurate — or, at the very least, premature. Per NPR, after reports became public that the satirical news empire had placed the winning bid to purchase Infowars, Jones contested the legitimacy of the auction in court, calling it a “mockery” and “rigged.” On December 10, the bankruptcy judge in this matter, Houston’s Christopher Lopez, sided with Jones and rejected the Onion’s bid to purchase the company. Infowars went bankrupt after losing a $1.4 billion defamation lawsuit filed by the families of children killed in the Sandy Hook massacre, which Jones circulated false theories about.
While Judge Lopez doesn’t agree with Jones that the process was a “mockery” — he stressed in his decision that he believed everyone involved had acted in good faith — he reasoned in his verdict that the auction process had lacked transparency and had left money on the table that might otherwise have been paid in restitution to the families of Sandy Hook victims. The Onion’s purchasing bid, meanwhile, had initially been placed with the support of these families, who expressed disappointment in Lopez’s decision through a statement put out by their lawyer, Chris Mattei. “These families, who have already persevered through countless delays and roadblocks, remain resilient and determined as ever to hold Alex Jones and his corrupt businesses accountable for the harm he has caused,” he said.
CEO Ben Collins, who heads the Onion’s parent company, Global Tetrahedron, also expressed disagreement with Lopez’s decision in a statement posted on X. “We are deeply disappointed in today’s decision, but The Onion will continue to seek a resolution that helps the Sandy Hook families receive a positive outcome for the horror they endured.” He added that the company would continue to take strides to attempt to purchase Infowars in the immediate future.
A statement from The Onion about InfoWars. pic.twitter.com/dtiQHSZ9vj
— follow @bencollins on bluesky (@oneunderscore__) December 11, 2024
The Onion’s initial intent when attempting to purchase Infowars was to turn it into a parody site and thereby put an end to the media giant’s spread of harmful misinformation. Now that its bid has been rejected, Jones will be able to continue hosting Infowars from the Infowars studio — at least for the next month or so. Judge Lopez has instructed the bankruptcy trustee in this case, Christopher Murray, to scrounge up a more lucrative offer for the site in the next 30 days.
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