They are major investors in and funders of conservative causes, including The Daily Wire, PragerU, and the 2016 presidential campaign of Senator Ted Cruz.
The brothers are sons of Myrtle and Gwyn Voy Wilks (went by his middle name) of Cisco in Eastland County, east of Abilene, Texas.
[3][4] In 1947, a group of parishioners from the Ramsey Church of Christ were disfellowship after a doctrinal dispute; these members included Charlie Fenter and his son-in-law Voy Wilks.
[12][13] As early as 2016[14] the Wilks Brothers began purchasing large quantities of land in Central Idaho, mainly in Ada, Boise, and Valley counties.
[16] The brothers' frequent refusal to allow hunting, snowmobiling, firewood cutting and transit frustrated locals.
[18] As of 2019, the Wilks brothers' shell company, DF Development, owned approximately 75,000 acres of land across 306 parcels in Valley County.
This request was denied after local hunters objected on the grounds that the brothers had closed down an access road to the wild and scenic Missouri River.
[19] The Wilks brothers were early investors in political commentator Ben Shapiro's media company The Daily Wire, a conservative news and opinion website in 2015.