‘It wasn’t just a job; it was a trap’: Ex-Infowars employee tells it all (Exclusive excerpt)

I knew something was wrong when I heard him breathing harder than usual, and moving quickly down the hall toward my office.

As I stared out the office window, preparing for Jones’ arrival, the first car appeared in the parking lot. Whoever was behind the wheel was driving fast, erratically, as if he was in a hurry to get somewhere he wasn’t invited. Close behind was an SUV, followed by a truck wrapped in an American flag sticker. For a moment I forgot that Jones was approaching until I heard his voice behind me. “We are under attack.”
His tone was filled with excitement that did not match the words. When I saw the American flag on the truck outside, I assumed they were fans of Jones’ show who had somehow discovered the location of his office. Although I tried to hide it, Jones was aware enough of it
A moment to note my doubts.

“See for yourself,” he said, pointing out the window.

When I returned to the parking lot, a group of men in military uniform jumped out of one of the vehicles and approached the office door. A few of them tried to peek inside while others beat their closed fists on the tinted glass. More people appeared from the side of the building, including a bald man wearing a red and yellow Italian football shirt. He had a megaphone strapped to his shoulder. like this
In the scene played outside, Jones rummaged in the metal locker behind me, pulled out one of his usual white Dixie cups and filled it with vodka.

“I know you’re there, Alex,” the man outside said over the loudspeaker. “I just want to talk to you. Come out so we can have a chat.”

Jones whispered to Dio and me to move away from the door. At first, I didn’t recognize the man outside, but when I looked around the corner, I realized it was Pete Santelli, the broker who had been with Cliven Bundy in Nevada. Santilli was at the head of a caravan headed to the southern border, a calculated move designed to fan the flames of concern about migrants crossing into America. Frustrated by Jones’ silence and lack of support, he stood outside, his voice ringing with urgency. “Okay,” he said, his words echoing through the parking lot. “I just saw someone there, so I know
You can hear me. Send Alex out. “I just want to talk.”

We heard a commotion coming from the other side of the building and rushed past the door, moving quickly down the hallway. By this time, several Infowars employees had gathered at the warehouse to see what was happening. Through the tinted glass of the delivery truck’s loading bay door, I saw more people in the back alley. We were surrounded. A metallic noise caught my attention in the far corner of the room, it sounded like heavy metal scraping against hinges. The door to Jones’ gun safe was open.

Cliff, an old high school friend of Jones’, was visiting the office that day, and I witnessed him and Dalton remove two Barrett M82 sniper rifles from the safe. They lowered the bipod mounts on each rifle and
They began loading the high-capacity magazines with .50-caliber shells pulled from heavy steel ammunition boxes. Jones paced back and forth like a false war general. He claimed to have seen one of the men outside holding a gun. Dalton and Cliff placed the guns on a long table in the warehouse and pointed them through the window at the strangers’ heads. “If any of them break through the glass, shoot them,” Jones said, swallowing the rest of his drink. This wasn’t the first time I feared someone would be shot and killed at work.

A week ago, I sat in the back of Dalton’s truck, surrounded by gunfire as we made our way to a private ranch owned by Cliff.

We hit the road early that morning, the sun creeping over the sand-colored pastures filled with cattle, heading to the same place John McAfee had taken us a year earlier. Upon his arrival, Cliff walked over
He ran through basic safety at the range and showed me how to load and fire some weapons. I didn’t have much experience with firearms despite growing up in a small southern town steeped in that culture. My dad had a gun for protection, but I never paid much attention. At that moment, I spotted Jones’ white Ford Raptor climbing a steep ravine in the distance. He got out of his truck and headed towards us. “You guys ready to blow some shit?” Jones asked, placing his hand on my shoulder. I can smell the liquor on his breath.

His goal for the day was to make a clickbait video of explosions and women holding weapons. Since McAdoo was the only woman on air at Infowars, he forced her to join us. She didn’t have much
Experienced firearms and her discomfort was palpable. Cliff tried to show her the ropes, but Jones was impatient. “It’s not rocket science, Lee Anne. Just grab the thing and pull the trigger.” He nudged me, giggling like a teenage boy.

This, as far as I can tell, is how Jones behaved with women, relying on sexual innuendo and treating them as objects for his amusement. To be fair, he didn’t treat the common man any better, but at least there was some respect. McAdoo fired an AR-15 grenade at the bowling pins we set up a few yards away. Despite her lack of experience, she shot well and only missed the target a few times.

It was hot outside, and I sat under a small tent with Dalton, Cliff, and Dio, loading empty magazines. McAdoo stood next to the cooler, and Jones kicked the dust a few feet away, using an AR-15-style weapon.
We were chatting, putting bullets into spring-loaded magazines, when suddenly there was a loud crash. Instinctively, we ducked down and looked around to see what had happened. A piece of dirt exploded in the air between me and McAdoo, and it took me a moment to realize what had just happened. Jones shot at us.

Gunshots rang out, echoing across the open fields surrounding us. “Sorry,” Jones said, pulling back the charging handle to inspect the gun’s chamber. We took the magazines out of the weapons,
But Jones failed to check whether the bullet was chambered and had no safety — two of the most important safety precautions Cliff taught me, and tried to teach McAdoo, before Jones grew impatient and interrupted.

There was a moment of silence as we all took in what had happened. “Damn,” Dalton said, looking at Cliff wide-eyed. McAdoo broke the silence. “What the hell was that?” I shouted. “Is anyone going to tell her it’s a joke?” Jones said. He looked bored. “It’s not funny,” McAdoo said.

“Okay, I apologize,” Jones replied, rolling his eyes. “But if I wanted to kill someone, I could.” His voice became calm. “It’s not like I haven’t done it before…”

We all looked at each other in confusion.

“I’m joking,” he interrupted with a sly smile.

In the face of McAdoo’s righteous indignation, Jones did not react angrily but insisted that he had fired in our direction on purpose, still trying to pass it off as a joke, like that somehow made it better. like
She stood in shock, and the others finally spoke, running like legendary lemmings from a cliff to defend him. It was insulting to watch them, knowing how crazy Jones’ actions were, and treating McAdoo as if they were.
Unhinged and devoid of humour. Although I backed away, I remained silent; Not only among cowards, but a large part of them.

As far as I can tell, Jones had no real friends in his life who were not financially indebted to him, and no relationships where the power dynamic was not in his favor. When he made mistakes, there was always someone, if not many, to enable him.

Almost as quickly as the bullet was fired, the moment was gone. McAdoo calmed down, and no one brought it up again. We resumed loading magazines, opened more beer bottles, filled an old television set with Tannerite, and blew it up.

At the office a week later, Jones continued to pace back and forth in the warehouse, pretending to be in a war movie while Buckley was in the hallway, calling the police. Dalton and Cliff kept the guns pointed outward, but no one approached the windows again. It didn’t take long for two officers to arrive in the parking lot and speak to Santelli. Santilli shouted into the building, asserting that the police had identified him He and his crowd
Peaceful and legal, stressing that they were not armed. “They came here to save you from some guy with an iPad and a bullhorn,” he said, mocking Jones.

We were all huddled on the other side of the windows, and Jones was acting as if he knew all along that they were unarmed, and laughing, ignoring the fact that just minutes before there had been sniper rifles pointed at people.
Outside, people who shared many of the same conspiratorial beliefs that he did.

“You’re a conspiracy theorist!” Santilli shouted into the megaphone. “You know who I am. I’m the guy you’ve been telling everyone I’m an FBI informant behind my back. I’m not an FBI informant, I’m
General detective. And you are paralyzed! Your father is a dentist who did specialist work for the CIA. What’s up with that? Alex, I came here to approach you and shake your hand, but you’re such an idiot
Come to the door.”

The fact that none of the conspiracy theorists realized the irony of calling each other conspiracy theorists was not lost on me.

I returned to my office in a daze as everyone resumed their work. With each extreme encounter, we all become less sensitive to the absurd, dividing how close we come to disaster. If Santilli had arrived a few hours earlier or a few hours later and met Jones in the parking lot, there is no telling what would have happened.

The scale of the threat had become familiar, and it only worsened a few weeks later when another threat revealed itself. Austin Police Chief Art Acevado told Jones his team did just that
Be aware of a man posting comments online speculating about the location of Infowars offices and threatening to drive from out of state to kill Jones and his employees. Acevado said they were
I followed this unknown man and discovered, through his posts, that he knew our address, had rented a car, and was on his way to Austin. They stopped him somewhere on the outskirts of town, and he was driving around with a box full of firearms.

He urged Jones to take this man seriously, warning that this wasn’t the first threat, but Jones waved his caution away like it was an annoyance. However, once Acevado left, Jones’ poise evaporated and was replaced by a frenetic energy. Go into the war room with me and me. “We are all in danger,” he said urgently. “This is not a game and we better be very serious.” Being part of Infowars was not just a temporary sacrifice, it was an irrevocable black mark on all of us, and according to Jones, working alongside him would forever stain our resumes and limit our prospects. “This is why we are all fighting to change the world,” he said. “Otherwise we won’t be able to live in it.” Dew seemed rejuvenated by this pep talk. But I was terrified, and my stomach was in knots. Finally it occurred to me: This wasn’t just a job; It was a trap.