Mike Cernovich

In 2014, Cernovich became a prominent figure in the Gamergate harassment campaign against several women in the video game industry, and through this built a following among the alt-right.

[5][6] He helped spread the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which falsely claimed that John Podesta and other high-ranking Democratic Party officials were involved in a child-sex ring.

[1] He unearthed old tweets by Sam Seder and James Gunn joking about pedophilia, and initially succeeded in pressuring to get them fired, but both were reinstated after public outcry.

[1] In 2015, Cernovich self-published Gorilla Mindset: How to Control Your Thoughts and Emotions, Improve Your Health and Fitness, Make More Money and Live Life on Your Terms, which became a bestseller in the motivational self-help category on Amazon.

[11] In 2016, Cernovich was an associate producer[12] for Cassie Jaye's documentary The Red Pill, which discusses the men's rights movement, and issues like male suicide, child custody, and educational inequality.

[13] The movie interviewed a wide range of conservative figures, including Anthony Scaramucci, Jordan Peterson, Scott Adams, James O'Keefe, and Alex Jones.

[17] In November 2016, white nationalist Richard B. Spencer, who also self-identified as alt-right, became its "indelible face" after a video of him giving a Nazi salute provoked universal outrage.

[21] Cernovich was one of the organizers of the January 2017 DeploraBall inaugural ball to celebrate Trump's victory;[22] the name was a reference to Hillary Clinton's earlier "basket of deplorables" comment.

[24] Notable attendees of the DeploraBall include Martin Shkreli, James O'Keefe, and Cassandra Fairbanks; Peter Thiel also briefly appeared.

[2] Clinton had previously experienced a brain concussion and blood clots, but testing found "complete resolution", and her doctors attested to her good health.

[2] In November 2016, Cernovich and other conspiracists promoted the baseless Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which misinterpreted the leaked Podesta emails to imply that high-ranking Democrats were involved in a child sex-trafficking ring.

[41] He also claimed that a 1997 video of Marina Abramovic's "spirit cooking" performance art constituted "occult symbolism" to "openly taunt the public", and that it proved that Clinton's inner circle was part of a sex cult.

[5] In 2016, Cernovich worked with Chuck Johnson and Wikileaks to offer a bounty for information supporting the conspiracy theory that murdered DNC staffer Seth Rich had been behind a leak of emails from the Democratic National Committee.

[47] In April 2017, Cernovich promoted a conspiracy theory that the Khan Shaykhun chemical attack in Syria was a hoax funded by an American financier.

[53] Cernovich's high prominence in pro-Trump social media circles led him to build a network of sympathetic sources, and break several stories on his blog, which he promoted on Twitter and video streaming sites like Periscope.

[55] New York Magazine's Jesse Singal deemed it gonzo journalism,[56] while CNN's Tom Kludt said Cernovich "gained prominence in the Trump-era for legitimate national security related scoops".

[57] On April 2, 2017, Cernovich broke the news that Susan Rice, Obama's national security advisor, had requested the unmasking of several Trump transition officials who appeared in intelligence reports.

[62] Trump himself, conservative commentators Tucker Carlson and David French, White House conselor Kellyanne Conway, and congressmen Rand Paul and Devin Nunes all promoted the story.

[65] The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza said there were "valid reasons" for concerns about unmasking, but that it was constrained by a legal process and independent review, and noted there was no evidence of misconduct.

[74] On October 12, 2017, Buzzfeed revealed the existence of the "Shitty Media Men" spreadsheet, which had been created a day earlier in the aftermath of the Harvey Weinstein scandal, and was used by female journalists to crowdsource allegations ranging from "weird lunch dates" to rape and stalking committed by their male coworkers.

He obtained it on October 21, claiming the source "was insistent on not accepting anything", and announced his intent to release it; he published two of the names, but held back the rest after consulting his lawyer.

[56] Singal described conservatives as believing "[people like Cernovich] are on the right side, and they're set to overtake those corrupt dinosaurs who have controlled the flow of information for far too long".

[82]In the same segment, VICE noted that only 32% of Americans trusted the press, and interviewed Eugene Yi of the MIT Media Lab, who showed that mainstream journalists had practically no reach among conservative Twitter users.

[88] In February 2020, Cernovich filed a third-party motion in Roger Stone's criminal case, calling for the release of the jury foreperson's questionnaire answers.

[97][47] According to O'Toole et al. writing in Gender Violence, "Cernovich's ongoing strategy, even after Gamergate itself died down, has been to promote conspiracy theories, provide dubious legal advice, and offer a constantly rotating platter of targets.

[98] In December 2017, Cernovich published a Medium post and contacted several journalists and news outlets about a joke tweet that comedian and MSNBC contributor Sam Seder had written in 2009.

[57] In response, Seder launched a GoFundMe campaign to help maintain funding for the show in the face of potential loss of advertising revenue, and also to produce a three-minute video educating people on Cernovich's tactics.

[100][102] AV Club wrote that "MSNBC has now fully bought into that smear campaign ... whose openly stated goal is the destruction of news outlets just like it through the use of blatantly manipulative trolling techniques.

[105] MSNBC primetime anchor Chris Hayes tweeted, "The entire culture and our politics are now dominated by people who have weaponized bad faith and shamelessness.

"[57] Columbia Journalism Review cited the incident as an example of a broader pattern of far-right media personalities using online smear campaigns to get mainstream journalists fired.