Right-wing radio host, conspiracy theorist, and Trump cheerleader Alex Jones has found himself in yet another uncomfortable position after President Donald Trump launched an attack on Iran over the weekend.
Jones has spent decades arguing that past U.S. military actions were illegitimate and part of a wide-ranging conspiracy. But now he’s been silent about Trump’s war, bringing two competing sides of Jones’ public persona into conflict.
During his show on Saturday, Jones noted reports of the bombing of a girls’ school in Minab, Iran, where 165 people were killed and another 96 were injured.
“This is gonna rage the world against Israel and the United States,” Jones lamented. “Trump used the nineteen eighties bombing that killed 200 plus servicemen as the reason we’re doing this. Well, then what do they get to do because of this?”
He argued that the bombing campaign betrayed what was “supposed to be America first.”
“I don’t like the turn of events. I don’t like the direction we’re starting to go,” Jones said. “This is a big, big, big deal, and this is a gigantic problem.”
Over the years, Jones has long argued that a dizzying array of world events were the work of a shadowy group of “globalist” elites as part of the so-called “New World Order.”
Among the events that “globalists” purportedly engineered are 9/11 and the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012. Jones has no real evidence of these conspiracies and has repeatedly changed the purported details of who was involved and why.
It was his promotion of these conspiracies that brought Jones into alignment with Trump, who pushed the notoriously racist “birther” conspiracy about former President Barack Obama. When Trump appeared on Jones’ show during the 2016 presidential campaign, he praised Jones as having “one of the greatest influences” he had ever seen.
Since then, Jones has stood by Trump—supporting his policies, attacking his detractors, and forwarding more outlandish claims. At one point during the 2016 cycle, Jones claimed that he was personally coordinating with Trump on conspiracies about Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
After Trump was elected, Jones said that he spoke to him on the phone and even took time on air to praise Trump’s penis. Yes, really.
But since Trump returned to office, things have taken a turn for the worse for Jones.
His company, Infowars, has been forced to sell off its assets after Jones lost the lawsuit brought against him by the surviving families of the Sandy Hook shooting. Jones used the show to claim that the shooting was a “false flag,” encouraging his listeners to go after the families of the kids who were shot and killed.
Jones also complained last year that he was betrayed by Trump, who spent years promising to release the Epstein files only to pull back once in office. Jones has frequently cited the Jeffrey Epstein case as proof of his “globalist” rantings.
Last year also saw the departure of Jones’ longtime employee and on-air personality Owen Shroyer, who said he was pressured to soften his criticisms of Trump.
Now Jones’ career of cheering on Trump—precisely the sort of elitist he once claimed was the poster boy for the “globalists”—has led to this moment.
Trump granted Jones access in exchange for support, only to be precisely the same kind of leader on which Jones built his career opposing.
Like Jones said, “This is a gigantic problem.”