A federal judge had a one-word answer for a company affiliated with the bankrupted Alex Jones that wants to restart the derailed sale of Infowars on its own terms.
Denied.
The ruling Wednesday by bankruptcy Judge Christopher Lopez marked the second time in as many months that he has shut down a request by First United American Companies to set the agenda for selling off Infowars to pay Sandy Hook families that Jones defamed a token of the hundreds of millions of dollars that he owes them.
“In a continuing good faith effort to initiate the process … FUAC made a new cash offer of $8 million, effectively doubling its prior bid … on December 19, 2024,” attorney Walter Cicack wrote to the judge earlier this week in federal bankruptcy court in Houston. “FUAC continues to be ready, willing and able to acquire the (Infowars) assets for $8 million.”
The Jones-affiliated company was hoping to jump-start an auction process that has stalled since December. That's when the same judge threw out the sale of Infowars to a group of Sandy Hook families who had partnered with the satirical news site the Onion, which planned to make Infowars a parody of itself.
The judge threw out the sale because it did not bring in enough cash, among other reasons.
In January, the Jones-affiliated company tried to get the judge’s attention about the new $8 million offer it had made, but the judge was then approving three settlements negotiated by the trustee he had put in charge of liquidating Jones’ assets.
The judge approved one of those settlements – a minor deal that ended a $68 million claim made by a company run by Alex Jones’ father for $375,000. But the judge denied a larger $16 million settlement among the two groups of Sandy Hook families who successfully sued Jones in Texas and Connecticut in 2022, after Jones called the 2012 massacre of 20 first-graders and six educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax” and “completely fake with actors.”
At the last hearing in early February, the judge said he was no longer keen on selling off the business components of Infowars, but rather was interested in selling off its ownership.
The Jones-affiliated company argued earlier this week that wasn’t a good idea.
“FUAC has reviewed the possibility of acquiring the (Infowars) equity but has reached the conclusion that acquiring the equity of (Infowars) simply is not feasible,” Cicack wrote. He noted that Infowars had multiple claims against it, including the $1.4 billion in defamation judgments for Sandy Hook families. “Any one of the multimillion-dollar risks make it impossible to value (Infowars’) equity.”
The only purchase that makes sense is Infowars' assets once they are declared “free and clear of claims” by the bankruptcy judge, Cicack argued.
The judge in denying the Jones-affiliated company’s emergency motion said he would hear the company’s argument in the “ordinary course” of the case, giving all sides a chance to weigh in. The case has already lasted 2 ½ years.
The only motion pending before the judge is from the trustee to refund the down payments deposited by the two buyers in the December auction for Infowars.