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Trump’s bond with GOP deepens after primary wins, FBI search

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump ‘s pick for governor in the swing state of Wisconsin easily defeated a favorite of the Republican establishment.

In Connecticut, the state that launched the Bush family and its brand of compassionate conservatism, a fiery Senate contender who promoted Trump’s election lies upset the state GOP’s endorsed candidate. Meanwhile in Washington, Republicans ranging from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to conspiracy theorist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene defended Trump against an unprecedented FBI search.

And that was just this week.

The rapid developments crystallized the former president’s singular status atop a party he has spent the past seven years breaking down and rebuilding in his image. Facing mounting legal vulnerabilities and considering another presidential run, he needs support from the party to maintain his political career. But, whether they like it or not, many in the party also need Trump, whose endorsement has proven crucial for those seeking to advance to the November ballot..

“For a pretty good stretch, it felt like the Trump movement was losing more ground than it was gaining,” said Georgia Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, who is urging his party to move past Trump. But now, he said, Trump is benefiting from “an incredibly swift tail wind.”

The Republican response to the FBI’s search of Trump’s Florida estate this week was an especially stark example of how the party is keeping Trump nearby. Some of the Republicans considering challenges to Trump in a 2024 presidential primary, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, were among those defending him. Even long-established Trump critics like Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan questioned the search, pressing for details about its circumstances.

But even before the FBI showed up at Mar-a-Lago, Trump was gaining momentum in his post-presidential effort to shape the GOP. In all, nearly 180 Trump-endorsed candidates up and down the ballot have won their primaries since May while fewer than 20 have lost.

Only two of the 10 House Republicans who supported Trump’s impeachment after the Jan. 6 insurrection are expected back in Congress next year. Rep. Jaime Herrera-Beutler, R-Wash., who conceded defeat after her Tuesday primary, it was the latest to fall. Leading Trump antagonist Rep. Liz CheneyR-Wyo., is at risk of joining her next week.

The Trump victories include a clean sweep of statewide primary elections in Arizona last week — including an election denier in the race for the state’s official chief elections. Trump’s allies also prevailed Tuesday across Wisconsin and Connecticut, a state long known for its moderate Republican leanings.

In Wisconsin’s Republican primary for governor, wealthy Trump-backed businessman Tim Michels defeated former Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, an establishment favourite. And in Connecticut, Leora Levy, who promoted Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen, emerged to an unexpected victory over a more moderate rival after earning Trump’s official endorsement.

On Monday, just hours after the FBI search, Trump hosted a tele-town hall rally on his behalf. Levy thanked Trump in her acceptance speech, while railing against the FBI’s search for her.

“All of us can tell him how upset and offended and disgusted we were at what happened to him,” she said. “That is un-American. That is what they do in Cuba, in China, in dictatorships. And that will stop.”

Despite his recent dominance, Trump — and the Republicans close to him — face political and legal threats that could undermine their momentum as the GOP fights for control of Congress and statehouses across the nation this fall.

While Trump’s picks have notched notable victories in primaries this summer, they may struggle in the fall. That’s especially true in several governor’s races in Democratic-leaning states such as Connecticut and Maryland, where GOP candidates must track to the center to win a general election.

Meanwhile, several Republicans with White House ambitions are moving forward with a busy travel schedule that will take them to politically important states where they can back candidates on the ballot this year and build relationships heading into 2024.

DeSantis plans to boost high-profile Republican contenders across Arizona, New Mexico, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Former Vice President Mike Penceanother potential 2024 presidential contender, is scheduled to appear next week in New Hampshire.

On the legal front, the FBI search was part of an investigation into whether the former president took classified records from the White House to his Florida residence. While Republicans have rallied behind Trump, very few facts about the case have been released publicly. Trump’s attorneys have so far declined to release details from the search warrant.

Prosecutors in Washington and Georgia are also investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election he falsely claimed was stolen. The Jan. 6 congressional commission has exposed damning details about Trump’s behavior from Republican witnesses in recent hearings, which have prompted new concerns, at least privately, among the GOP establishment and donor class.

And on Wednesday, Trump invoked his Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination as he testified under oath Wednesday in the New York attorney general’s long-running civil investigation into his business dealings.

Trump’s legal entanglements represent a distraction at best for Republican candidates who’d rather focus on President Joe Biden’s leadership, sky-high inflation and immigration troubles to help court moderate voters and independents in the general election.

“Today, every Republican in every state in this country should be talking about how bad Joe Biden is, how bad inflation is, how difficult it is to run a business and run a household,” said Duncan, the Georgia lieutenant governor. “But instead, we’re talking about some investigation, we’re talking about Donald Trump pleading the Fifth, we’re talking about Donald Trump endorsing some conspiracy theorist.”

Trump critics in both parties are ready and willing to highlight Trump’s shortcomings — and his relationship with midterm candidates — as more voters begin to pay attention to politics this fall.

“This is, and always has been, Donald Trump’s Republican Party,” Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison said in an interview, condemning “MAGA Republicans” and their “extreme agenda” on abortion and other issues.

At the same time, the Republican Accountability Project and Protect Democracy launched a $3 million television and digital advertising campaign this week across seven swing states focused on Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 insurrection. The ads, which will run in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, feature testimonials from Republican voters who condemn Trump’s lies about nonexistent election fraud that fueled the Capitol attack.

One ad features congressional testimony from Cheney, the Wyoming Republican who has publicly declared that Trump should never hold public office again.

Still, Cheney faces her own primary election against a Trump-backed challenger next week in Wyoming. One of Trump’s top political targets this year, she is expected to lose. Anticipating a loss, Cheney’s allies suggest she may be better positioned to run for president in 2024, either as a Republican or independent.

Trump’s allies are supremely confident about his ability to win the GOP’s presidential nomination in 2024. In fact, aides who had initially pushed him to launch his campaign after the November midterms are now encouraging him to announce sooner to help freeze out would-be Republican challengers .

“It’s going to be very difficult for anyone to take the nomination away from him in 2024,” said Stephen Moore, a former Trump economic adviser who has spoken with Trump about his 2024 intentions. “He is running. That is a certainty.”

Rep. Tom Rice, RS.C., predicted that Trump would “lose in a landslide” if he sought the presidency again, adding that the former president’s overall grasp on the party is “eroding on the edges.”

“In a normal election, you’ve got to win not just the base. You’ve got to win the middle, too, right, and maybe crossover on the other side,” said Rice, who lost his recent primary after voting in favor of Trump’s second impeachment.

Rice warned that Trump far-right candidates could lead to unnecessary losses for the party in November. “Donald Trump is pushing things so far to the right,” he said in an interview.

Meanwhile, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, eyeing a 2024 bid himself, warned against making bold political predictions two years before the Republican Party selects its next presidential nominee.

“We’re sitting here in August of 2022,” Christie said in an interview. “My sense is there’s a lot of water over the dam still to come before anybody can determine anybody’s individual position in the primaries of ’24 — except to say that if Donald Trump runs, he will certainly be a factor.”

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Associated Press writers Susan Haigh in Hartford, Connecticut, and Meg Kinnard in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report.

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Alex Jones ordered to pay $45.2M more over Sandy Hook lies

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Texas jury on Friday ordered conspiracy theorist Alex Jones to pay $45.2 million in punitive damages to the parents of a child who was killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, adding to the $4.1 million he must pay for the suffering he put them through by claiming for years that the nation’s deadliest school shooting was a hoax.

The total — $49.3 million — is less than the $150 million sought by Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, whose 6-year-old son Jesse Lewis was among the 20 children and six educators killed in the 2012 attack in Newtown, Connecticut. But the trial marks the first time Jones has been held financially liable for peddling lies about the massacre, claiming it was orchestrated by the government to tighten gun laws.

Afterward, Lewis said that Jones — who wasn’t in the courtroom to hear the verdict — has been held accountable. She said when she took the stand and looked Jones in the eye, she thought of her son de ella, who was credited with saving lives by yelling “run” when the killer paused in his rampage.

“He stood up to the bully Adam Lanza and saved nine of his classmates’ lives,” Lewis said. “I hope that I did that incredible courage justice when I was able to confront Alex Jones, who is also a bully. I hope that he inspires other people to do the same.”

It could be a while before the plaintiffs collect anything. Jones’ lead attorney, Andino Reynal, told the judge he will appeal and ask the courts to drastically reduce the size of the verdict.

After the hearing, Reynal said he thinks the punitive amount will be reduced to as little as $1.5 million.

‘We think the verdict was too high. … Alex Jones will be on the air today, he’ll be on the air tomorrow, he’ll be on the air next week. He’s going to keep doing his job holding the power structure accountable.”

Jones’ companies and personal wealth could also get carved up by other lawsuits and bankruptcy. Another defamation lawsuit against Jones by a Sandy Hook family is set to start pretrial hearings in the same Austin court on Sept. 14. He faces yet another defamation lawsuit in Connecticut.

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Plaintiffs’ attorney Mark Bankston said he believes he can challenge any attempt to reduce the damages. But he said even if the award is drastically cut, it’s just as important to take the big verdict into the bankruptcy court for the family to claim against Jones’ estate and company.

Jones testified this week that any award over $2 million would “sink us.” His company Free Speech Systems, which is Infowars’ Austin-based parent company, filed for bankruptcy protection during the first week of the trial.

Punitive damages are meant to punish defendants for particularly egregious conduct, beyond monetary compensation awarded to the individuals they hurt. A high punitive award is also seen as a chance for jurors to send a wider societal message and a way to detect others from the same abhorrent conduct in the future.

Barry Covert, a Buffalo, New York, First Amendment lawyer with no connection to the Jones case, said the total damages awarded amount to “a stunning loss for Jones.”

“With $50 million in all, the jury has sent a huge, loud message that this behavior will not be tolerated,” Covert said. “Everyone with a show like this who knowingly tells lies—juries will not tolerate it.”

Future jurors in other pending Sandy Hook trials could see the damage amounts in this case as a benchmark, Covert said. If other juries do, Covert said, “it could very well put Jones out of business.”

Attorneys for the family had urged jurors to hand down a financial punishment that would force Infowars to shut down.

“You have the ability to stop this man from ever doing it again,” Wesley Ball, an attorney for the parents, told the jury Friday. “Send the message to those who desire to do the same: Speech is free. Lies, you pay for.”

An economist testified that Jones and the company are worth up to $270 million.

Bernard Pettingill, who was hired by the plaintiffs to study Jones’ net worth, said records show that Jones withdrew $62 million for himself in 2021, when default judgments were issued in lawsuits against him.

“That number represents, in my opinion, a value of a net worth,” Pettingill said. “He’s got money put in a bank account somewhere.”

But Jones’ lawyers said their client had already learned his lesson. They argued for a punitive amount of less than $300,000.

“You’ve already sent a message. A message for the first time to a talk show host, to all talk show hosts, that their standard of care has to change,” Reynal said.

Friday’s damages drew praise from the American Federation of Teachers union, which represented the teachers at Sandy Hook.

“Nothing will ever fix the pain of losing a child, or of watching that tragedy denied for political reasons. But I’m glad the parents of Sandy Hook have gotten some justice,” union President Randi Weingarten said in a tweet.

Lawyers for the Sandy Hook families suing Jones contend he has tried to hide evidence of his true wealth in various shell companies.

During his testimony, Jones was confronted with a memo from one of his business managers outlining a single day’s gross revenue of $800,000 from selling vitamin supplements and other products through his website, which would approach nearly $300 million in a year. Jones called it a record sales day.

Jones, who has portrayed the lawsuit as an attack on his First Amendment rights, granted during the trial that the attack was “100% real” and that he was wrong to have lied about it. But Heslin and Lewis told jurors that an apology wouldn’t suffice and called on them to make Jones pay for the years of suffering he has put them and other Sandy Hook families through.

The parents told jurors they’ve endured a decade of trauma, first inflicted by the murder of their son and what followed: gunshots fired at a home, online and phone threats, and harassment on the street by strangers. They said the threats and harassment were all fueled by Jones and his conspiracy theory spread to his followers via Infowars.

A forensic psychiatrist testified that the parents suffer from “complex post-traumatic stress disorder” inflicted by ongoing trauma, similar to what might be experienced by a soldier at war or a child abuse victim.

Throughout the trial, Jones was his typically bombastic self, talking about conspiracies on the witness stand, during impromptu news conferences and on his show. His erratic behavior by him is unusual by courtroom standards, and the judge scolded him, telling him at one point: “This is not your show.”

The trial drew attention from outside Austin as well.

Bankston told the court Thursday that the US House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol has requested records from Jones’ phone that Jones’ attorneys had mistakenly turned over to the plaintiffs. Bankston later said he planned to comply with the committee’s request.

By Friday, Bankston said, he had “a subpoena sitting on my desk’ from the Jan. 6 committee. But he said he needed to “tamp down expectations” that it might reveal texts about the insurrection since it appears to have been scraped for data in mid-2020.

Bankston said he’s also had “law enforcement” interest in the phone data, but he declined to elaborate.

Last month, the House committee showed graphic and violent text messages and played videos of right-wing figures, including Jones, and others vowing that Jan. 6 would be the day they would fight for Trump.

The committee first subpoenaed Jones in Novemberdemanding a deposition and documents related to his efforts to spread misinformation about the 2020 election and a rally on the day of the attack.

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Associated Press writer Michael Tarm in Chicago and Susan Haigh in Norwich, Connecticut, contributed to this report.

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Find AP’s full coverage of the Alex Jones trial at: https://apnews.com/hub/alex-jones

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US

Alex Jones ordered to pay Sandy Hook parents more than $4M

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A Texas jury Thursday ordered conspiracy theorist Alex Jones to pay more than $4 million — significantly less than the $150 million being sought — in compensatory damages to the parents of a 6-year-old boy killed in the Sandy Hook massacre, marking the first time the Infowars host has been held financially liable for repeatedly claiming the deadliest school shooting in US history was a hoax.

The Austin jury must still decide how much the Infowars host should pay in punitive damages to Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewiswhose son Jesse Lewis was among the 20 children and six educators who were killed in the 2012 attack in Newtown, Connecticut.

The parents had sought at least $150 million in compensation for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Jones’ attorney asked the jury to limit damages to $8 — one dollar for each of the compensation charges they considered — and Jones himself said any award over $2 million “would sink us.”

It likely won’t be the last judgment against Jones — who was not in the courtroom — over his claims that the attack was staged in the interests of increasing gun controls. A Connecticut judge has ruled against him in a similar lawsuit brought by other victims’ families and an FBI agent who worked on the case. He also faces another trial in Austin.

Jones’ lead attorney, Andino Reynal, winked at his co-counsel before leaving the courtroom. He declined to comment on the verdict.

Outside the courthouse, the plaintiffs’ attorney Mark Bankston insisted that the $4.11 million amount wasn’t a disappointment, noting it was only part of the damages Jones will have to pay.

The jury returns Friday to hear more evidence about Jones and his company’s finances.

In a video posted on his website Thursday night, Jones called the reduced award a major victory.

“I admitted I was wrong. I admitted it was a mistake. I admitted that I followed disinformation but not on purpose. I apologized to the families. And the jury understood that. What I did to those families was wrong. But I didn’t do it on purpose,” he said.

The award was “more money than my company and I personally have, but we are going to work on trying to make restitution on that,” Jones said.

Bankston suggested any victory declarations might be premature.

“We aren’t done folks,” Bankston said. “We knew coming into this case it was necessary to shoot for the moon to get the jury to understand we were serious and passionate. After tomorrow, he’s going to owe a lot more.”

The total amount awarded in this case could set a marker for the other lawsuits against Jones and underlines the financial threat he’s facing. It also raises new questions about the ability of Infowars — which has been banned from YouTube, Spotify and Twitter for hate speech — to continue operating, although the company’s finances remain unclear.

Jones, who has portrayed the lawsuit as an attack on his First Amendment rightsgranted during the trial that the attack was “100% real” and that he was wrong to have lied about it. But Heslin and Lewis told jurors that an apology wouldn’t suffice and called on them to make Jones pay for the years of suffering he has put them and other Sandy Hook families through.

The parents testified Tuesday about how they’ve endured a decade of trauma, first inflicted by the murder of their son and what followed: gun shots fired at a home, online and phone threats, and harassment on the street by strangers. They said the threats and harassment were all fueled by Jones and his conspiracy theory spread to his followers via his website Infowars.

A forensic psychiatrist testified that the parents suffer from “complex post-traumatic stress disorder” inflicted by ongoing trauma, similar to what might be experienced by a soldier at war or a child abuse victim.

At one point in her testimony, Lewis looked directly at Jones, who was sitting barely 10 feet away.

“It seems so incredible to me that we have to do this — that we have to implore you, to punish you — to get you to stop lying,” Lewis told Jones.

Barry Covert, a Buffalo, New York, First Amendment lawyer who is not involved in the Jones case, said the $4 million in compensatory damages was lower than he would have expected given the evidence and testimony.

“But I don’t think Jones can take this as a victory,” he added. “The fact is, $4 million is significant even if we might have thought it would be a little higher.”

Jurors often decline to award any punitive damages after deciding on a compensation figure. But when they choose to, the punitive amount is often higher, Covert said. He said he expects the parents’ attorneys to argue that jurors should send the message that no one should profit off defamation.

“They will want jurors to send the message that you can’t make a quarter of a billion in profit off harming someone and say you’ll just take the damages loss in court,” Covert said.

Jones was the only witness to testify in his defense, and he only attended the trial sporadically while still appearing on his show. And he came under withering attack from the plaintiffs attorneys under cross-examination, as they reviewed Jones’ own video claims about Sandy Hook over the years, and accused him of lying and trying to hide evidence, including text messages and emails about the attack. It also included internal emails sent by an Infowars employee that said “this Sandy Hook stuff is killing us.”

At one point, Jones was told that his attorneys had mistakenly sent Bankston the last two years’ worth of texts from Jones’ cellphone. Bankston said in court Thursday that the US House Jan. 6 committee investigating the 2021 attack on the US Capitol has requested the records and that he intends to comply.

And shortly after Jones declared “I don’t use email,” Jones was shown one that came from his address, and another one from an Infowars business officer telling Jones that the company had earned $800,000 gross in selling its products in a single day, which would amount to nearly $300 million in a year.

Jones’ media company Free Speech Systems, which is Infowars’ parent company, filed for bankruptcy during the two-week trial.

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Associated Press writer Michael Tarm in Chicago contributed to this report.

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For more of the AP’s coverage of school shootings: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings

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Sports

Tennis 2022: Australian Daria Saville stuns top seed Jessica Pegula in huge upset at Washington Open

Australia’s Daria Saville upset top-seeded defending champion Jessica Pegula 7-5, 6-4 on Wednesday at the Washington Open.

World No. 88 Saville ripped the seventh-ranked American in hot and humid conditions while Romanian third seed Simona Halep retired with illness down 7-5 2-0 to Anna Kalinskaya.

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“I stayed really composed,” Saville said.

“I managed the energy really well. It was very hot. But I thought it’s hot for everyone so get on with it.”

Saville booked a quarterfinal match against Canadian qualifier Rebecca Marino, who beat Germany’s Andrea Petkovic 6-3 3-6 6-1.

The 28-year-old Russian-born Aussie won her only WTA title at the 2017 Connecticut Open but dispatched Pegula in 98 minutes for her second top-10 win of the year after downing Ons Jabeur at Indian Wells in March.

“Everyone’s attitude is I’m here to win the tournament and I’m no different,” Saville said. “I’m playing really good tennis right now. I’m excited for more.”

Saville fell to 627th in the world rankings after Achilles tendon surgery that sidelined her for most of last year.

Now she is into her third quarter-final of the year after Miami and Guadalajara.

“I’m happy,” Saville said.

“It creates good reputation. Players are going to say, ‘she’s playing well. She has some good wins this year’.

On the men’s side of the draw, Nick Kyrgios defeated Tommy Paul in straight sets to move into the round of 16 and continue his strong form ahead of the US Open.

It wasn’t such good news elsewhere among the Australian contingent in Washington, with Alexei Popyrin and Alex de Minaur losing to Taylor Fritz and Yoshihito Nishioka, respectively.

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Alex Jones concedes Sandy Hook attack was ‘100% real’

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones testified Wednesday that he now understands it was irresponsible of him to declare the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre a hoax and that he now believes it was “100% real.”

Speaking a day after the parents of a 6-year-old boy who was killed in the 2012 attack testified about the suffering, death threats and harassment they’ve endured Because of what Jones has trumpeted on his media platforms, the Infowars host told a Texas courtroom that he definitely thinks the attack happened.

“Especially since I’ve met the parents. It’s 100% real,” Jones said at his trial to determine how much he and his media company, Free Speech Systems, owe for defaming Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis. Their son Jesse Lewis was among the 20 students and six educators who were killed in the attack in Newtown, Connecticut, which was the deadliest school shooting in American history.

But Heslin and Lewis said Tuesday that an apology wouldn’t suffice and that Jones needed to be held accountable for repeatedly spreading falsehoods about the attack. They are seeking at least $150 million.

Closing arguments are expected to begin later Wednesday after more testimony from Jones, who has portrayed the lawsuit as an attack on his First Amendment rights.

Jones is the only person testifying in his own defense. His attorney asked him if he now understands it was “absolutely irresponsible” to push the false claims that the massacre didn’t happen and no one died.

Jones said he does, but added, “They (the media) won’t let me take it back.”

He also complained that he’s been “typecast as someone that runs around talking about Sandy Hook, makes money off Sandy Hook, is obsessed by Sandy Hook.”

Jones’ testimony came a day after Heslin and Lewis told the courtroom in Austin, where Jones and his companies are based, that Jones and the false hoax claims he and Infowars pushed made their lives a “living hell” of death threats, online abuse and harassment.

They led a day of charged testimony Tuesday that included the judge scolding the bombastic Jones for not being truthful with some of what he said under oath.

In a gripping exchange, Lewis spoke directly to Jones, who was sitting about 10 feet away. Earlier that day, Jones was on his broadcast program telling his audience that Heslin is “slow” and being manipulated by bad people.

“I am a mother first and foremost and I know you are a father. My son existed,” Lewis said to Jones. “I am not deep state … I know you know that … And yet you’re going to leave this courthouse and say it again on your show.”

At one point, Lewis asked Jones: “Do you think I’m an actor?”

“No, I don’t think you’re an actor,” Jones responded before the judge admonished him to be quiet until called to testify.

Heslin and Lewis are among several Sandy Hook families who have filed several lawsuits alleging that the Sandy Hook hoax claims pushed by Jones have led to years of abuse by him and his followers.

Heslin and Lewis both said they fear for their lives and have been confronted by strangers at home and on the street. Heslin said his home and car had been shot at. The jury heard a death threat sent via telephone message to another Sandy Hook family.

“I can’t even describe the last nine and a half years, the living hell that I and others have had to endure because of the recklessness and negligence of Alex Jones,” Heslin said.

Scarlett Lewis also described threatening emails that seemed to have uncovered deep details of her personal life.

“It’s fear for your life,” Scarlett Lewis said. “You don’t know what they were going to do.”

Heslin said he didn’t know if the Sandy Hook hoax conspiracy theory originated with Jones, but it was Jones who “lit the match and started the fire” with an online platform and broadcast that reached millions worldwide.

“What was said about me and Sandy Hook itself resonates around the world,” Heslin said. “As time went on, I truly realized how dangerous it was.”

Jones skipped Heslin’s Tuesday morning testimony while he was on his show — a move Heslin dismissed as “cowardly” — but arrived in the courtroom for part of Scarlett Lewis’ testimony. He was accompanied by several private security guards.

“Today is very important to me and it’s been a long time coming… to face Alex Jones for what he said and did to me. To restore the honor and legacy of my son,” Heslin said when Jones wasn’t there.

Heslin told the jury about holding his son with a bullet hole through his head, even describing the extent of the damage to his son’s body. A key segment of the case is a 2017 Infowars broadcast that said Heslin did not hold his son.

The jury was shown a school picture of a smiling Jesse taken two weeks before he was killed. The parents didn’t receive the photo until after the shooting. They described how Jesse was known for telling classmates to “run!” which likely saved lives.

An apology from Jones wouldn’t be good enough, the parents said.

“Alex started this fight,” Heslin said, “and I’ll finish this fight.”

Jones later took the stand and was initially combative with the judge, who had asked him to answer his own attorney’s question. Jones testified he had long wanted to apologize to the plaintiffs.

Later, the judge sent the jury out of the room and strongly scolded Jones for telling the jury he had complied with pretrial evidence gathering even though he didn’t and that he is bankrupt, which has not been determined. The plaintiffs’ attorneys were furious about Jones mentioning he is bankrupt, which they worry will taint the jury’s decisions about damages.

“This is not your show,” Judge Maya Guerra Gamble told Jones. “Your beliefs do not make something true. You are under oath.”

Last September, the judge admonished Jones in her default judgment over his failure to turn over documents requested by the Sandy Hook families. A court in Connecticut issued a similar default judgment against Jones for the same reasons in a separate lawsuit brought by other Sandy Hook parents.

At stake in the trial is how much Jones will pay. The parents have asked the jury to award $150 million in compensation for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The jury will then consider whether Jones and his company will pay punitive damages.

Jones has already tried to protect Free Speech Systems financially. The company filed for federal bankruptcy protection last week. Sandy Hook families have separately sued Jones over his financial claims from him, arguing that the company is trying to protect millions owned by Jones and his family from him through shell entities.

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Associated Press writer Paul J. Weber contributed to this report.

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For more of the AP’s coverage of school shootings: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings

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Sandy Hook parents: Alex Jones claims created ‘living hell’

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Fighting back tears and finally given the chance to confront conspiracy theorist Alex Jonesthe parents of a 6-year-old killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting described being put through a “living hell” of death threats, harassment and ongoing trauma over the last decade caused by Jones using his media platforms to push claims that it was all a hoax.

The parents led a day of charged testimony that included the judge scolding the bombastic Jones for not being truthful with some of what he said under oath.

Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, whose son Jesse was killed at Sandy Hook, took the witness stand Tuesday on the final day of testimony in the two-week defamation damages trial against Jones and his media company Free Speech Systems. They are seeking at least $150 million in damages.

In a gripping exchange, Lewis spoke directly to Jones, who was sitting about 10 feet away. Earlier that day, Jones was on his broadcast program telling his audience that Heslin is “slow” and being manipulated by bad people.

“I am a mother first and foremost and I know you are a father. My son existed,” Lewis said to Jones. “I am not deep state… I know you know that… And yet you’re going to leave this courthouse and say it again on your show.”

At one point, Lewis asked Jones: “Do you think I’m an actor?”

“No, I don’t think you’re an actor,” Jones responded before the judge admonished him to be quiet until called to testify.

Lewis continued trying to impress on Jones that the Sandy Hook shooting and trauma inflicted in the decade since then were real.

“It seems so incredible to me that we have to do this — that we have to implore you, to punish you — to get you to stop lying,” Lewis said. “I am so glad this day is here. I’m actually relieved. And grateful… that I got to say all this to you.”

Jones visibly shook his head several times while Scarlett Lewis was addressing him.

Heslin and Lewis are among several Sandy Hook families who have filed several lawsuits alleging that Sandy Hook hoax claims pushed by Jones have led to years of abuse by Jones and his followers.

Heslin and Lewis both said they fear for their lives and have been confronted by strangers at home and on the street. Heslin said his home and car had been shot at. The jury heard a death threat sent via telephone message to another Sandy Hook family.

“I can’t even describe the last nine and a half years, the living hell that I and others have had to endure because of the recklessness and negligence of Alex Jones,” Heslin said.

Scarlett Lewis also described threatening emails that seemed to have uncovered deep details of her personal life.

“It’s fear for your life,” Scarlett Lewis said. “You don’t know what they were going to do.”

Heslin said he didn’t know if the Sandy Hook hoax conspiracy theory originated with Jones, but it was Jones who “lit the match and started the fire” with an online platform and broadcast that reached millions worldwide.

“What was said about me and Sandy Hook itself resonates around the world,” Heslin said. “As time went on, I truly realized how dangerous it was.”

Jones skipped Heslin’s morning testimony while he was on his show — a move Heslin dismissed as “cowardly” — but arrived in the courtroom for part of Scarlett Lewis’ testimony. He was accompanied by several private security guards.

“Today is very important to me and it’s been a long time coming… to face Alex Jones for what he said and did to me. To restore the honor and legacy of my son,” Heslin said when Jones wasn’t there.

Heslin told the jury about holding his son with a bullet hole through his head, even describing the extent of the damage to his son’s body. A key segment of the case is a 2017 Infowars broadcast that said Heslin did not hold his son.

The jury was shown a school picture of a smiling Jesse taken two weeks before he was killed. The parents didn’t receive the photo until after the shooting. They described how Jesse was known for telling classmates to “run!” which likely saved lives.

An apology from Jones wouldn’t be good enough, the parents said.

“Alex started this fight,” Heslin said, “and I’ll finish this fight.”

Jones later took the stand himself, initially being combative with the judge, who had asked him to answer his own attorney’s question. Jones testified he had long wanted to apologize to the plaintiffs.

“I never intentionally tried to hurt you. I never said your name until this came to court,” Jones said. “The internet had questions, I had questions.”

Later, the judge sent the jury out of the room and strongly scolded Jones for telling the jury he complied with pretrial evidence gathering even though he didn’t, and that he is bankrupt, which has not been determined. Plaintiff’s attorneys were furious about Jones mentioning he is bankrupt, which they worry will taint a jury decision about damages.

“This is not your show,” Judge Maya Guerra Gamble told Jones. “Your beliefs do not make something true. You are under oath.”

Last September, Guerra admonished Jones in her default judgment over his failure to turn over documents requested by the Sandy Hook families. A court in Connecticut issued a similar default judgment against Jones for the same reasons in a separate lawsuit brought by other Sandy Hook parents.

Heslin and Lewis suffer from a form of post-traumatic stress disorder that comes from constant trauma, similar to that endured by soldiers in war zones or child abuse victims, a forensic psychologist who studied their cases and met with them testified Monday.

Jones has portrayed the lawsuit against him as an attack on his First Amendment rights.

At stake in the trial is how much Jones will pay. The parents have asked the jury to award $150 million in compensation for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The jury will then consider whether Jones and his company will pay punitive damages.

The trial is just one of several Jones faces.

Courts in Texas and Connecticut have already found Jones liable for defamation for his portrayal of the Sandy Hook massacre as a hoax. In both states, judges issued default judgments against Jones without trials because he failed to respond to court orders and turn over documents.

Jones has already tried to protect Free Speech Systems financially. The company filed for federal bankruptcy protection last week. Sandy Hook families have separately sued Jones over his financial claims from him, arguing that the company is trying to protect millions owned by Jones and his family from him through shell entities.

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Associated Press writer Paul J. Weber contributed to this report.

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For more of the AP’s coverage of school shootings: https://apnews.com/hub/school-shootings

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Alex Jones on trial: Sandy Hook parents testify about the ‘hell’ he has caused


New York
CNN Business

The parents of a child who was murdered during the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting delivered emotional testimony in a Texas court on Tuesday, telling a jury that the lies pushed by right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones have stained the legacy of their son and tormented them for years.

The jury hearing the case will determine how much in damages Jones will have to pay the parents, Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, who won a default judgment against him earlier this year. An attorney representing Heslin and Lewis asked the jury last week to award Heslin and Lewis $150 million.

Fighting back tears at times, Heslin told the jury that Jones, through his conspiratorial media organization Infowars, “tarnished the honor and legacy” of his son. Heslin said that he couldn’t “even begin to describe the last nine-and-a-half years of hell” he has endured because of Jones.

“There’s got to be a strong deterrent that shall prevent him from peddling this propaganda,” Heslin said, adding that through his testimony he wanted “to restore my credibility, my reputation, and Jesse’s legacy that he so much deserves.”

As Heslin testified, a television screen in the court showed a photograph of his murdered son, six-year-old Jesse Lewis. Jones, who is expected to testify in his own defense later on Tuesday, was absent from the courtroom during Heslin’s testimony and the first part of Lewis’ testimony. Heslin called that absence “a cowardly act.”

“I’ve been here for a week and a half and [during] my final testimony Mr. Alex Jones does not have the courage to sit in front of me or face me,” Heslin said.

An attorney representing Heslin and Lewis told CNN the two have needed to be in isolation and under the protection of professional security during the trial.

Heslin also said on the stand that the lie pushed by Jones “resonates around the world” and that he has realized “how dangerous” it is.

Heslin described being repeatedly confronted by those who believed Jones over the last ten years, saying such interactions occur “right up to this day.”

“My life has been threatened,” Heslin said. “I fear for my life. I fear for my safety and my family’ safety and their life.”

Lewis also testified in court that she has been harassed and received death threats, including at her own home, all of which she said reopens the wounds surrounding her son’s murder.

“The fear and anxiety and unsafeness … keeps me from healing,” Lewis said. “It definitely negatively impacts the healing process.”

Lewis described the conspiracy theories about Sandy Hook as “deeply unsettling.”

“I feel compromised,” Lewis said, describing how she feels about her own personal safety.

Roy Lubit, a forensic psychiatrist who was hired to conduct an examination of Heslin and Lewis, testified to the court on Monday how terrified and worried for their personal safety the two parents are.

Neil Heslin, the parent of a Sandy Hook victim, took the stand today in the Alex Jones defamation trial taking place in Texas.

Lubit told the court that Lewis and Heslin “are very, very frightened.” When asked to specify who they are frightened of, Lubit responded, “Some follower of Jones trying to kill them.”

Lubit elaborated that Lewis sleeps with a gun, a knife, and pepper spray on her night stand. Lubit added she won’t even turn on the air conditioning during hot days for fear of not being able to hear an intruder possibly coming to hurt her.

Lewis testified Tuesday that she owns a gun to keep her other son safe, telling the jury that she failed to keep one son safe and will do everything in her power to ensure that no harm happens to her other child.

Jury selection for a similar trial involving Jones and Sandy Hook families commenced on Tuesday in Connecticut, where Jones was also found liable for damages earlier this year.

Jones has lashed out at the judicial proceedings taking place, baselessly claiming last week that he was being tried in Texas before a “kangaroo court.” Infowars has also published content attacking the judges overseeing the cases in viscous terms.

Jones’ media company, Free Speech Systems, which is the company that operates Infowars, filed for bankruptcy protection on Friday.

Attorneys representing some Sandy Hook families have accused Jones of having drained Free Speech Systems of assets in recent years as part of an effort to protect himself from potential judgments he may be ordered to pay.

One of the attorneys, Avi Moshenberg, told CNN on Tuesday that the bankruptcy filing made by Free Speech Systems indicated that $62 million in assets had been withdrawn from the company in 2021 and 2022.

“If you look at the bankruptcy filing, leading up to the declaration of bankruptcy, Alex Jones, the sole owner [of Free Speech Systems], took $62 million in draws in 2021 and 2022,” Moshenberg told CNN. “Just straight up draws. That’s why the company has few assets.”

A lawyer representing Jones did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday morning. But a hearing is scheduled on Wednesday in which W. Marc Schwartz, the chief restructuring officer for Free Speech Systems, is expected to testify.

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CT man arrested for driving over 160 mph on New Hampshire highway

ASHLAND, NH (WTNH) – New Hampshire troopers arrested a Danbury man on Sunday after he drove over 160 miles per hour (mph) on a highway. The highway’s speed limit was only 70 mph.

Authorities said that just after 11 am, troopers patrolling I-93 North in Ashland spotted an orange car driving at nearly 161 mph. Due to incredibly high speeds, the patrol officer who spotted the car was unable to pursue it. Instead, officials said the officer placed a Be On the Lookout Order (BOLO).

Minutes later, troopers received multiple reports about sports cars driving erratically and at high speeds, with some reports including an orange sports car. According to these testimonies, the speed nearly caused a few crashes.

The Woodstock Police Department said it heard the BOLO report, and positioned officers on the highway to intercept the orange sports car. They eventually clocked the car going 130 mph.

Officers were able to stop the orange 2021 Chevrolet Corvette at exit 32, when it became stuck in traffic. They held the driver, Alejandro Zapata-Rebello, 30, of Danbury until state troopers could arrive.

Zapata-Rebello was charged with two charges of reckless driving, and one charge of disobeying an officer. Woodstock police said they also charged him with reckless driving.

Officials said Zapata-Rebello was released on a summons to appear in court on September 22.

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