Alex Jones speaking with attendees at The People's Convention at Huntington Place in Detroit, Michigan.
For four years, Josh Owens was beside prolific MAGA podcaster Alex Jones, filming, traveling and editing video for InfoWars before he finally realized he was being manipulated by a volatile con artist.
Speaking to Charlie Warzel for the "Galaxy Brain" podcast from The Atlantic, Owens said that he doesn't want to be absolved of his role in helping Jones spread his conspiracies. What he hopes to do with his new book is to help people understand how the lies were made.
Owens went to film school and won a contest to work for Jones. One reason he wanted to vote for Jones, Owens continued, is he grew up in a close evangelical community.
"...[T]hat was what I was raised on. And at the exact time that I was introduced to Jones, I was stepping away from that world. Jones, in a lot of ways, sort of lines up to the televangelist way of doing things. It’s all about 'everything is motivated by fear,'" he said. "Everything is motivated by, there is this intense need to accomplish this thing in order to quite literally save the world. That’s the narrative that he spins."
"So yeah, I mean, him being in my ear constantly was a big part of that. But also just the ideology, and the grandness of the ideology, was such an attractive concept. And I think that’s part of the reason that I decided to go there. Another part of the reason was I was trying a lot of stuff at the time. I interned a day at Tyler Perry Studios in Atlanta," he recalled.
He was ultimately offered a job by Perry's studio and by Jones. Jones was the choice, in large part, he said, because he felt he had more of a purpose."Like maybe it could serve something bigger than myself. Maybe it could do something. Maybe, you know, I think at the time I was naively well-meaning," Owens explained.
The interest wasn't political, he said, because he knew nothing about politics at that time. That's how he got sucked into politics. And Jones, he said, was the " ultimate micromanager." His mood determined what they were talking about on the show. Owens writes in the book that Jones was also "an extremely volatile and manipulative presence."
Owens said it is "the essence of how he operates. And how he, you know, keeps the people around him is that sometimes Jones could be kind of what you see on his show: this raging lunatic who is screaming about literal demons running the world. And then, in an instant, he is this complete other person; he is at times warm and jovial and fun to be around. But on my first day, I was sort of warned about that. I was told that that could turn on a dime, and sort of to always be watching out for it. Jones might try and rope you into a joke—but don’t play along, because you could be the reason that that turns."
Classic manipulation, Warzel called it. And Owens agreed "Yeah; that’s the job. That is the job whether you’re in the office; that’s the job whether you’re in the field; that’s the job whether you’re, you know, shooting a video with him. About politics or whether it’s about the products that he’s selling. Like, no matter what, it’s about 'How do we do what he wants?'"
He added that he was so desperate for Jones' approval that he wondered if that's why Jones pulled him into the inner circle. "Because he knew that I almost wanted it as much as he was sort of demanding it. And so, those people who were closest to him … I think he sort of senses that. And then he pulls those people in, because he can get what he needs out of them," said Owens.
Warzel wanted to know whether Jones truly believed some of the things he said.
"When people ask me that question — like, not what he believes, but 'Does he believe the things that he says?' — my feeling on that has changed a little bit. I used to say, 'Who cares?' Like, it doesn’t matter what he believes. He has been doing this for two decades plus. He broadcasts on his show six days a week, for hours a day. I don’t even think he could tell you what he believes, and what he doesn’t believe, with the things that he says. But his audience believes it. And so, ultimately, it doesn’t matter," Owens said.
He then quoted a book by Harry Frankfurt, which describes liars as intentionally skewing the truth, while bulls—— don't care about the truth.
The Sandy Hook conspiracy was different, Owens said. "That’s something deeper and darker. That Jones, I feel like, just doesn’t care about how his rhetoric affects people. I think you could probably hook Jones up to a lie-detector test, and he would pass it. I don’t think he cares what the truth is. So, I think it frees him up, in some sense, to sort of say whatever he feels is of value to him in any given moment."
When Owens left he spoke to NPR's "This American Life" and "Jones sent me this voice memo that was very manipulative. And it was him saying that if I had to do that for people to like me, that’s fine. That’s okay. But he likes me, he cares about me, but he refuses to become my villain. And the mainstream people that I might be talking to are much worse than him, and I need to keep that in mind." When fact-checkers reached out to Jones for comment, he got two threats from Jones and there hasn't been any communication since.
For those trying to get out of the far-right world of Jones and even Donald Trump, Owens said he doesn't have the answer, but he knows that it can be done, because he did it.