Sixteen months after its purchase of Infowars was blocked by a federal bankruptcy judge, the Onion has announced a new takeover plan that would give the satirical news outlet control of the website founded by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.
“This is the culmination of a two-year-long effort to get some justice for the Sandy Hook families,” Ben Collins, the Onion’s chief executive, wrote on LinkedIn Monday. ”After a mountain of threats and nonsense, InfoWars will be ours.”
In 2024, Jones was ordered to put the site up for sale to pay the more than $1 billion he owes to the families of Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims for falsely claiming that the 2012 massacre that killed 20 children and six adults in Newtown, Conn., was staged.
The Onion won a silent auction to acquire Infowars, which Collins said he planned to relaunch as a parody of itself. But Judge Christopher Lopez of U.S. Bankruptcy Court halted the sale, citing a “lack of clarity” in the auction process and disputes over the bids, which were submitted by the Onion and a company affiliated with Jones.
The judge later directed the families to seek liquidation in a state court in Texas, where Jones is based.
In August 2025, Judge Maya Guerra Gamble ruled that a court-appointed administrator would oversee the sale of Infowars’ assets, opening the door for the Onion to mount another takeover bid.
What’s the new plan?
On Monday, Collins said that Global Tetrahedron, the Onion’s parent company, had reached an agreement with the administrator to license Infowars.com and its associated intellectual property for $81,000 a month for six months, with the option to renew.
Collins said he hopes to eventually turn Infowars into a network for independent comedy, adding that the Sandy Hook families would receive any profits from the new site.
He also announced that Tim Heidecker, half of the comedy duo Tim & Eric, will serve as the creative director of Infowars.
In a video posted to Instagram, Heidecker said it was an “honor to take over the reins and chart a new path towards the future.”
“I just thought it would be just a beautiful joke if we could take this pretty toxic, negative, destructive force of Infowars and rebrand it as this beautiful place for our creativity,” he told the New York Times.
But the judge must still approve the licensing deal, and Jones can appeal any ruling. A hearing in Travis County District Court has been scheduled for April 30.
How did Jones respond?
In a post on X, Jones said that the Onion had “fraudulently” claimed ownership of Infowars.
On his live show Monday, Jones said he would fight against the takeover bid while continuing to broadcast from a new studio, if necessary.
“I’m going to continue the exact same show,” he said. “It’ll just be called the ‘Alex Jones Show.’ So, it’s the same satellite, same system. It’s a different news site and news studio. So I’m not going anywhere.”
What did the Sandy Hook families say?
In a statement to CNN, Christopher Mattei, an attorney for the Connecticut families, said they backed the Onion’s plan.
“The Sandy Hook families took on Alex Jones to stop him from inflicting the same harm on others. For years, he used his corrupt business platform to torment and harass them for profit,” Mattei said. “When InfoWars finally goes dark, the machinery of lies that Jones built will become a force for social good, thanks to the families’ courage and The Onion’s vision, persistence and stewardship.”
How did we get here?
In 2018, the families of 10 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims sued Jones and his media company, Free Speech Systems, which operates the Infowars website, for defamation, saying they had been tormented and threatened by people who were convinced by Jones that the shooting was a hoax.
A subsequent trial in Connecticut in 2022 featured often-tearful testimony from victims’ relatives who said they were repeatedly harassed after Jones claimed that they were “crisis actors.” Jones showed no remorse when he took the witness stand, proclaiming that he was “done saying I’m sorry” for his role in spreading lies about the massacre.
In 2022, juries in Connecticut and Texas found Jones liable for $1.4 billion in damages to the Sandy Hook families. He has yet to pay them.
