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Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
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16 Nov, 5 tweets, 3 min read
Infowars' longtime IT Director Michael Zimmermann snatched up domains like "tarrantmanifesto dot com" (referring to the Christchurch killer) and "shooter chan dot com" from Epik, the hack shows.

Me @hannahgais and @MeganSquire0:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
Rob Monster of Epik also hired Zimmermann for his own team. This should put his "who what me" responses to questions about white supremacy under more scrutiny.

He spoke apologetically of David Duke in a 2019 livestream:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2019…
It's complex, so please read the whole story. An apparent shadow technical team undergirds Infowars, Epik, AND Nick Fuentes' America First network.

Zimmerman is the head of it. And they're all apparently into the most fringe, extreme far-right bullshit:
Simon “Sasquatch” Dickerman, who I photographed at Fuentes’ moronic vax event, contributes to this team.

He’s also the guy I saw scaring Tennessee churchgoers in 2017.

He couldn’t even make eye contact when I asked him about this stuff.

Free advice: Don’t live this way.
And read this separate scoop from Hannah which puts a new face on the accelerationist movement.

All these guys put their trust in Rob Monster and Epik’s “free speech” brand:

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More from @MichaelEHayden

Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
23 Sep
NEW — Six people including his sister identified an image of a man inside the Capitol as Charles Bausman.

Bausman is a Pro-Kremlin propagandist and extreme far-right activist who reappeared in Moscow after Jan 6:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
In October 2020, I reported out a Russian email address buried in the source code of U.S. white supremacist websites.

We traced the emails address to Charles Bausman of the Kremlin propaganda site Russia Insider:
We then found the same website infrastructure being used in a partisan, Pro-Trump propaganda site called Lancaster Patriot.

This site focused on Pennsylvania swing state matters — poorly written, divisive junk news:
Read 5 tweets
Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
1 Sep
Russia Insider founder Charles Bausman involved himself in Pennsylvania-based Stop the Steal activism and then took his act to Washington D.C. on Jan 6.

Then he disappeared, leaving the Christmas lights still hanging from his home.

My latest:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
.@NataliaAntonova provided translation, geolocation and context help with this one.

Really amazing person to work with.
In October 2020, I reported on a Russian email address buried in the source code of U.S. white nationalist sites, all linked to Russia Insider.

Activists also spotted Bausman with white nationalists hanging around a BLM event in Lancaster last year:
Read 7 tweets
Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
25 Aug
The Jan. 6 committee is seeking Trump WH contacts with the neo-Nazi collaborator and scammer Jack Posobiec.

@Hatewatch detailed some of his Trump ties in Part I of our series on him: splcenter.org/splc-investiga…
Our press really noticed Posobiec for the first time days after Unite the Right when Trump retweeted his effort to divert attention to Chicago violence.

But it followed months of working with neo-Nazis, promoting Polish fascism, etc: splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020…
I would also be curious to learn more about what kind of relationship Posobiec has with Trump's son:
Read 5 tweets
Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
7 Jul
.@Twitter gave far-right extremists the platform they needed to plan an attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, and the website will enable politically motivated violence again in the future if it isn't reformed.

My analysis here: splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
Grateful for guest appearances by @beccalew @MeganSquire0 @BostonJoan @jaredlholt Brian Friedberg @3r1nG and others here.

This was a hard one to put together because of the size. There is more to report from here.
Among other things, @Twitter verified and promoted the extremists who abused their platform to hype Pizzagate.

The fifth anniversary is looming and so I also spoke to James Alefantis of Comet Ping Pong about how they marketed them at his expense:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
Read 10 tweets
Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
17 Jun
Big money donors pumped *$4.3 million* into the white nationalist non-profit VDARE in 2019.

If you want signs of how the conservative movement has changed after Trump, read this.

Me with @alexkotch:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
Readers may recall my story from 2020. VDARE bought a historic castle in West Virginia for 1.4 million in cash.

This helps explain how they set up their new home base:
splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020…
How else does VDARE spend their $$$?

They dispatched goons to DC last summer during the George Floyd protests. The goons pretended to be VICE Canada reporters and told demonstrators to ID themselves on their stream.

Again, $4.3m but banned from YouTube:
Read 4 tweets
Michael Edison Hayden Profile picture
28 Apr
NEW: The U.S. named an obscure website called "SouthFront" as being the product of Russian military intelligence.

Jack Posobiec linked to it 28 times in 10 months during the runup to the election, serving as a central source of its spread to Americans: splcenter.org/hatewatch/2021…
You would be forgiven for sensing a pattern here. Jack Posobiec has been involved now in multiple schemes linked to Russian military intelligence operations:

h/t @JamesFourM who flagged Posobiec's interest in SouthFront to me.

It's not like tons of verified accounts shared this website. I wouldn't even know it existed if not for reporting on Posobiec.
Read 4 tweets

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