January 6 committee receives text messages from Alex Jones: Sandy Hook’s parents’ attorney delivers messages two years after being ordered to pay nearly $50 million in damages
- Alex Jones has lost his lawsuit against two parents of a 6-year-old Sandy Hook victim
- During cross-examination last week, the parents’ lawyer revealed that Jones’ lawyer had inadvertently given the plaintiffs two years’ worth of texts
- Lawmakers asked for the text messages last week, multiple outlets reported
- Jones previously sat in camera at the Jan. 6 committee and then boasted about invoking the Fifth Amendment on his show
The House inquiry into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol is now in possession of a spate of text messages from conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ cellphone, it was reported Monday.
CNN reports that lawmakers on the bipartisan panel have been handed two years’ worth of correspondence from and to Jones as they make connections between the US Capitol riot and an attempt by Donald Trump and his allies to overthrow the 2020 election.
The panel reportedly received the texts from attorney Mark Bankston, who is representing the parents of a 6-year-old killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school shooting.
The parents won a lawsuit against Jones last week after he repeatedly called the massacre a “false flag” and claimed the children killed were crisis actors, in addition to making a host of other inappropriate remarks about the shooting.
Jones was ordered to pay the two families nearly $50 million in penalties and damages.
A spokesman for the Jan. 6 committee declined to comment when asked by .
Bankston apparently surprised Jones when he revealed during cross-examination last week that the defendant’s attorney had inadvertently sent the plaintiff’s attorney a large amount of text messages – which Bankston said proved that Jones had lied under oath when testifying in his own defence .
Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones has been sentenced to pay nearly $50 million in damages to the parents of a 6-year-old killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre
‘Mister. Jones, did you know that 12 days ago your lawyers screwed it up and sent me a complete digital copy of your entire cell phone with every text message you’ve sent for the past two years? Bankston asked in the now-viral moment of the trial.
Presiding Justice Maya Guerra Gamble denied a request by Jones’ attorney to protect the texts from House investigators.
“I don’t stand between you and Congress,” Gamble reportedly told Bankston.
Jones testified remotely in a closed session before the Jan. 6 committee earlier this year.
He later revealed the meeting on his radio show and boasted that he invoked the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination “nearly 100 times.”
Jones said at the time: “The questions were pretty reasonable overall. And I wanted to answer the questions. But at the same time, it’s good that I didn’t because I’m the type of person who tries to answer things correctly even if I don’t know all the answers and then they can kind of claim it’s perjury.”
The January 6 committee is now reportedly in possession of Jones’ text messages received by Sandy Hook’s parents’ attorney
A vocal Trump ally, Jones was a key promoter of the ex-president’s 2020 electoral fraud lies and is accused by the committee of helping plan his stop-the-steal rally in the White House Ellipse shortly before the riot.
Jones was also present at the US Capitol grounds on Jan. 6 but did not enter the building, according to a letter sent to Jones in November 2021 by committee chairman Bennie Thompson.
It’s not immediately clear when the committee will shower the new trove of texts or if they will prompt further investigation.
MP Zoe Lofgren, a member of the panel, said she was interested in looking at Jones’ lyrics but had not seen them as of Sunday.
“Well, we know that his behavior encouraged some of the January 6 behaviors and we want to know more about that,” Lofgren told CNN.
“We don’t know what we’re going to find in the lyrics because we haven’t seen them. But we will look at it and find out more, I am sure.”
If they prove useful, the texts could play a starring role in the committee’s next round of hearings, unveiled by Vice Chair Liz Cheney in the eighth and final installment of the panel’s summer presentation series.
The additional hearings are expected this fall, according to the Wyoming Republican.
“Over the course of these hearings, we have received new evidence, and new witnesses have come forward boldly,” Cheney said at the conclusion of the committee’s ninth full-length hearing on July 21.
“Efforts to bring lawsuits and overcome immunity and executive privileges have been successful and continue. Doors have opened, new subpoenas have been issued and the dam is beginning to break.’
She added, “We have far more evidence to share with the American people and still more to gather. As such, our committee will spend August following new information on multiple fronts before convening further hearings in September.’