Ali Alexander: Difference between revisions

Ali Alexander (born 1984 or 1985),

Ali Akbar was born in 1984 or 1985.[1]^[2] He went by that name until partway through his career as an activist, when he renamed himself Ali Alexander.^[2][8]

Alexander is a convicted felon, stemming from felony property theft and credit card abuse charges in 2007 and 2008.^[8][9][10]

He identifies as Christian,^[11] Black, and Arab.^[12] As of November 2020^[update], Alexander lived in Texas.^[2]

Activism

Alexander has been variously described as a Republican operative,^[13] far-right personality,^[3] right-wing provocateur,^[15] and part of the New Right. The Observer wrote in 2018 that Alexander "has a history of dog whistling to the nationalist wing of the MAGA movement".^[10] Alexander has worked with other far-right personalities including Alex Jones, Roger Stone, Jacob Wohl, and Laura Loomer.^[9]

Alexander emerged in right-wing politics around the same time as the

Later, he renamed himself Ali Alexander and became an outspoken supporter of President Donald Trump.^[8]

Social media

Alexander is a social media personality popular among conservatives. In early 2019, he was known for his livestream videos published via Periscope, in which he discussed his conservative and pro-Trump opinions.^[17][18] In July 2019, Alexander attended a "social media summit" at the White House, an event that was attended by a mix of politicians and far-right pundits.^[18][19][20] As of August 2019, Alexander had over 100,000 Twitter followers.^[20] In 2018, Jack Dorsey spoke with Alexander regarding whether it was advisable to ban Alex Jones from Twitter, stating that Alexander had "interesting points" to make. Alexander rejected the idea of banning Jones. Twitter initially declined to ban Jones, but later banned him in September 2018 after he was banned from a spate of other social networks. Alexander himself was briefly banned from Twitter in January 2017, which he said was because he had tweeted at Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, "I would *literally* put you down if you came near me, Marxist. I would call 911 to come retrieve your body. Have a Good Friday!" He was unbanned later that day.^[17] In January 2021, following the storming of the U.S. Capitol building, Alexander was banned from Twitter, as was the Twitter account for the Stop the Steal campaign.^[8]

Alexander also used the alt-tech service Parler, on which he had 41,000 followers before Parler went offline on January 11, 2021.^[14][21]

Deplatforming

After the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, Twitter banned Alexander's personal account and a Stop the Steal account on January 10. Alexander was also banned from PayPal, Venmo, and Patreon following the riot, and permanently banned from Facebook and Instagram.^[22][23]

Conspiracy theories

Alexander is a conspiracy theorist^[6] who has promoted various unfounded and discredited claims, including that widespread electoral fraud led to Biden's victory over Trump in the 2020 presidential election,^[24][25] Alexander describes himself as the "national organizer" of the campaign.^[7][1] He began to organize large rallies in Washington, D.C. to protest the results of the election, sometimes feuding with other organizers over who should be given credit,^[8] and solicited donations online to fund the events.^[26][27] that then-Senator and presidential candidate Kamala Harris is "not an American Black",^[28] and that Representative Ilhan Omar married her brother to grant him U.S. citizenship.^[29]

Ilhan Omar and Kamala Harris

In February 2019, Alexander arranged for himself and two fellow conspiracy theorists, Jacob Wohl and Laura Loomer, to travel to

In August 2019, Alexander earned media attention for what The Washington Post said had been described as a "birther-like" campaign against then-Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris. That month, he tweeted Harris was "not an American Black", further claiming that "I'm so sick of people robbing American Blacks (like myself) of our history. It's disgusting".^[28] The New York Times wrote that in the tweet, Alexander had "falsely claimed Senator Kamala Harris was not black enough to be discussing the plight of black Americans". Donald Trump Jr. retweeted the claim, then deleted it.^[20][31]

Stop the Steal

In 2020, Alexander founded Stop the Steal, a campaign promoting the conspiracy theory that falsely posits that widespread electoral fraud occurred during the 2020 presidential election to deny Donald Trump victory over Joe Biden.^[24] Among the conspiracy theories that Alexander promoted as part of Stop the Steal was a claim, dubbed "#Maidengate", that people had used their maiden names to vote more than once.^[32]

2021 storming of the United States Capitol

Alexander was identified as one of the people who encouraged Trump supporters to rally outside the

The Daily Beast observed that "Alexander led a host of activists in ratcheting up the rhetoric" before January 6, and that Alexander's posts "grew more menacing" as the date approached.^[8] Alexander tweeted on December 7, 2020 that he would "give [his] life for this fight", a tweet that was controversially retweeted by the Arizona Republican Party with the addition, "He is. Are you?".^[8][37][38] ProPublica identified a December 23, 2020 Parler post of Alexander's, in which he wrote "If D.C. escalates... so do we", as "one of scores of social media posts welcoming violence" before the attack.^[27]

On January 6, the morning rallies outside the Capitol building preceded the

After the attack on the Capitol, Alexander said he did not support what had happened,[41] and that he wished people had not entered, or even approached, the Capitol building.^[18] The Daily Beast reported that Alexander had gone into hiding after the attack, and taken down a website promoting his rally.^[8] Twitter banned Alexander's personal account and a Stop the Steal account on January 10. Alexander was also banned from PayPal, Venmo, and Patreon following the riot, and permanently banned from Facebook and Instagram.^[22][23] According to Reuters, Alexander had continued to post "violent rhetoric" online following the attack.^[42]

References