Rick Wiles

Rick Wiles
Born (1953-08-20) August 20, 1953 (age 71)
Maryland, U.S.
OccupationRadio host
Years active1998–present
Employers
Movement
Websitewww.trunews.com

Rick Wiles (born August 20, 1953)[1] is a far-right[2][3][4] American conspiracy theorist,[5][6][7] pundit, and Christian fundamentalist senior pastor at the non-denominational Flowing Streams Church. He is the founder of TruNews, a website promoting racist, homophobic, and antisemitic conspiracy theories.[8][9][10]

Wiles has said that Jews seek to obtain control of countries to "kill millions of Christians", and has claimed that Jews are "deceivers" and that Jews "plot, they lie, they do whatever they have to do to accomplish their political agenda".[11] In February 2020, YouTube permanently banned the TruNews channel.[12]

  1. ^ Wiles, Richard. "Final Day Book Introduction". TruNews. Retrieved 7 June 2020.
  2. ^ Kasimov, Andrey (29 July 2021). "Soldiers of 4chan: The Role of Anonymous Online Spaces in Backlash Movement Networks". In Devries, Melody; Bessant, Judith; Watts, Rob (eds.). Rise of the Far Right: Technologies of Recruitment and Mobilization. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 156. ISBN 978-1-78661-493-3 – via Google Books. Another 33% linked to far-right propaganda blogs. Some of these were blogs by members of specific far-right movements such as James P. Wickstrom of the Christian Identity movement and Rick Wiles of TRUNews, a racist, homophobic, anti-semitic conspiracy theorist who has amassed a lot of followers.
  3. ^ Barna, Ildikó; Knap, Árpád (2021). "An exploration of coronavirus-related online antisemitism in Hungary using quantitative topic model and qualitative discourse analysis". Intersections. East European Journal of Society and Politics. 7 (3). Hungarian Academy of Sciences: Centre for Social Sciences: 91. doi:10.17356/ieejsp.v7i3.801. hdl:10831/109625. ISSN 2416-089X. Retrieved 14 June 2024. For example, when Rick Wiles, a far-right American political commentator and conspiracy theorist, said, 'God is spreading the coronavirus in synagogues as a punishment for opposing Jesus'
  4. ^ Adelakun, Abimbola Adunni (14 October 2022). "The Noisome Pestilence: COVID-19 Pandemic and Conspirituality of "Fake Science"". Powerful Devices: Prayer and the Political Praxis of Spiritual Warfare. Rutgers University Press. p. 97. ISBN 978-1-9788-3153-7 – via Google Books. Part of what he shared were stories that had already been bandied around on social media by other entrepreneurs of truth, such as when far-right U.S. conservative Rick Wiles urged Christians to stand and fight Bill Gates.
  5. ^ Al-Rawi, Ahmed; Celestini, Carmen; Stewart, Nicole; Worku, Nathan (21 March 2022). "How Google Autocomplete Algorithms about Conspiracy Theorists Mislead the Public". M/C Journal. 25 (1). doi:10.5204/mcj.2852. ISSN 1441-2616. Retrieved 14 June 2024.
  6. ^ Lu, Heng-yang; Yang, Jun; Fang, Wei; Song, Xiaoning; Wang, Chongjun (1 January 2022). "A deep neural networks-based fusion model for COVID-19 rumor detection from online social media". Data Technologies and Applications. 56 (5): 806–824. doi:10.1108/DTA-06-2021-0160. ISSN 2514-9288 – via ProQuest. For example, the end times conspiracy theorist Rick Wiles declared that COVID-19 vaccines are a plot to depopulate the world by changing DNA.
  7. ^ Maule, Will (August 6, 2019). "Pastor Rick Wiles Asks for $100 Million to Set-Up End Times Global Broadcasting Network". Christian Headlines. Retrieved August 31, 2019.
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference Thebault was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ Rudoren, Jodi (November 27, 2019). "Far-Right Pastor Calls Impeachment A 'Jew Coup,' Begs Trump To 'Wake Up'". Forward. Retrieved November 27, 2019.
  10. ^ "TruNews and Rick Wiles: 'End Times' Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism". Anti-Defamation League. January 13, 2020. Retrieved February 7, 2020. TruNews is a fundamentalist Christian streaming news and opinion platform that has increasingly featured anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist content, and also has a long record of disseminating radical Islamophobic and anti-LGBTQ messages.
  11. ^ Kampeas, Ron (January 23, 2020). "Trump White House Again Credentials Website That Called Impeachment a 'Jew Coup'". Haaretz. JTA. Retrieved January 24, 2020.
  12. ^ Slisco, Aila (February 20, 2020). "YouTube Bans Anti-Semitic Channel TruNews After Founder Calls Trump Impeachment 'Jew Coup'". Newsweek. Retrieved February 21, 2020.