Anthime Joseph "Tim" Gionet (born 1987 or 1988),[1] more commonly known as Baked Alaska, is an American far-right influencer[2][3][4][5] who gained notoriety through his advocacy on behalf of alt-right and white supremacist ideology.
At the beginning of 2019, Gionet claimed to have changed his views and released videos in which he denounced the alt-right and meme culture as sources of terrorism and violence.
As part of an attempt to rebrand himself, he gave a series of interviews condemning the alt-right and expressed plans to establish a non-profit organization in order to teach anti-racism to white supremacists.
In November 2019, Gionet reverted to his earlier politics, professing far-right ideology and collaborating with the white nationalist Groyper movement.
[12][13][14] Originally known as an extremely online personality, Baked Alaska was gradually banned from most mainstream social media platforms.
[24] In 2006, Gionet left Alaska for Los Angeles and attended Azusa Pacific University,[10] where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in marketing.
In order to make it more "unique", Gionet changed the nickname to "Baked Alaska", a reference to him being a marijuana user and a play on the dessert of the same name.
[10] In 2011, Gionet worked for Capitol Records for a short time, before pursuing his own career in rap music with a "wild, redneck, kick-ass" persona.
While in Los Angeles, he was also involved in the party scene and had issues with drugs and alcohol, leading him to seek professional help to get sober.
Unhappy with his life in Los Angeles and the lack of progress of his musical career, Gionet was about to return to Alaska when his social media skills and popularity on Vine led him to be hired by BuzzFeed.
[26] As he had done during his rap career, Gionet was protective of his real name while he worked at BuzzFeed; most of his colleagues knew him only as "Alaska" and some of his employers believed his family name was "Treadstone", after another of his aliases.
[1] Gionet first identified politically as a libertarian, supporting Rand Paul's 2016 presidential campaign and the legalization of marijuana, and participating in Black Lives Matter street demonstrations.
[45] Gionet was maced by unknown assailants during the rally; a video which showed him pouring milk on his face to try to neutralize the chemical went viral in September 2017.
[49] He was permanently banned from Twitter after posting a photoshopped image of Laura Loomer, a Jewish far-right activist, inside a gas chamber.
He released an emotional video apologizing for his past participation in meme culture, and stated: "I was brainwashed, I felt like I was part of a cult".
Gionet also alleged a link between meme culture and the Christchurch mosque shootings, and warned of conservatives becoming radicalized to the far-right.
[50][51] In the course of his attempted rebranding, Gionet claimed in an interview with The Daily Beast that he was never serious about far-right politics, and thought that the alt-right "was just fun memes and jokes and edgy 4chan posting" until he "got to the end of this rabbit hole and realized these guys are serious".
He deleted his apology videos, and began collaborating with the white nationalist Groyper movement in its "trolling" of Turning Point USA rallies.
[11] From 2019, Gionet became known for his livestreams in which he often filmed himself variously annoying, harassing, insulting and sometimes pepper spraying bystanders at the whims of his audience.
He was reportedly paid tens of thousands of dollars by Internet viewers who found his conduct amusing, or agreed with the political messages.
[17] Gionet was arrested in multiple livestreamed instances of trespassing and assault, including pepper spraying a bouncer, in Scottsdale, Arizona, in December 2020.
[62][63][64] On January 14, 2021, Gionet failed to appear at a court hearing in Scottsdale in which prosecutors aimed to revoke his pre-trial release that had been granted after his December 2020 arrest related to the incident with the bouncer.