The Onion’s bid for Infowars is still in court as judge reviews auction

A bankruptcy judge is investigating The Onion’s bid Alex Jones The Infowars platform was expected to hear a second day of testimony on Tuesday after an auctioneer defended the satirical news channel winning offer in November.

It is not clear how soon U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Lopez in Houston will decide whether to approve the offer. The Onion, which wants to transform Infowars’ website and social media accounts into parodiesoffered $1.75 million for Infowars assets during the auction.

Jones was not present for the start of the key hearing on Monday and instead continued broadcasting from his studios in Austin.

Jeff Tanenbaum, president of ThreeSixty Asset Advisors, was questioned Monday by lawyers for Jones and the company in a Houston courtroom about how The Onion’s bid was valued at $7 million and why a live auction was not held. He defended both the value of the bid and its selection after the two sealed bids were opened.

Lopez could ultimately decide whether to void The Onion’s bid, name Jones’ affiliate as the winner or hold another auction, among other options.

Jones and First United American Companies, which operates a website selling nutritional supplements on Jones’ behalf and submitted the other bid for fraud and conspiracy during the auction which ended on November 14. The curator and The Onion deny the allegations and accuse Jones and the company of sour grapes. The first American companies offered $3.5 million.

The sale of Infowars is part of this Jones’ personal bankruptcy casewhich he filed at the end of 2022 after being ordered to pay almost $1.5 billion in defamation lawsuits in Connecticut and Texas brought by family members of victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut. Jones repeatedly called the 2012 shooting that killed 20 children and six teachers a hoax staged by actors and aimed at increasing gun control.

Most of the proceeds from the sale of Infowars, as well as much of Jones’ personal property, will go to the Sandy Hook families to help satisfy verdicts from juries and judges in state courts in Connecticut and Texas. Part of the proceeds will go to Jones’ other creditors.

The Onion’s bid also included a promise by many of the Sandy Hook families to forego some or all of the auction proceeds because they would give other creditors a total of $100,000 more than they would receive in other bids.

The trustee, Christopher Murray, chose The Onion, saying his proposal was better for creditors because they would receive more money. The Onion valued the offer, along with the Sandy Hook families’ offer, at $7 million, because that amount was equal to a purchase price that would provide the same amount to the other creditors.

Tanenbaum testified that he agreed with the $7 million valuation and believed The Onion’s bid complied with auction rules.

An attorney for Jones, Ben Broocks, asked Tanenbaum how it was possible for the Sandy Hook families’ bid to increase The Onion’s bid to such a high amount.

“It means that the value of the purchase price has increased because another purchase price would have to be higher than that value to provide the same net benefit to that group of creditors,” Tanenbaum said.

During his opening argument, Broocks said there was no way The Onion should have been chosen over First United American.

“How does a bid of €1.75 million beat a bid of €3.5 million?” he asked. “How can that $1.75 million be bigger? Well, it’s voodoo economics to coin a phrase.”

Joshua Wolfshohl, an attorney for Murray, told the judge Monday that there was no misconduct during the auction. He called the complaints from Jones and First United American Companies unfounded.

“The vast majority of their complaints are just fantastic, imagined conspiracy theories that have no basis in reality,” he said.

The Murray, The Onion and the Sandy families deny allegations of wrongdoing. In his own filing, Murray called the allegations “an improper attempt by a disappointed bidder to influence an otherwise fair and open auction process.”

The auction included all equipment and other assets at the Infowars studio in Austin, Texas, as well as the social media accounts, websites, video archive and product trademarks. Jones uses the studio to broadcast his far-right, conspiracy theory-filled shows on the Infowars website, his account on the social platform X and radio stations.

Jones has another studio, websites and social media accounts set up in case The Onion gets approval to buy Infowars and kicks him out. Jones has said he can continue using the Infowars platforms if the auction winner is friendly to him.

Jones is appealing the $1.5 billion in judgments citing freedom of expression, but has acknowledged that the school shooting happened.