I've temporarily ended my Twitter divorce. But I think it's for good reason.
On April 12th, The Daily Beast published an article about the DeSantis Campaign. It featured the story of Steven Jarvis, a conspiracy theorist, and serial harasser. The author, Jake Lahut, paints Jarvis as a long-time disinformation researcher and a victim. He got played.
Since Apr 12, NOT ONE Daily Beast employee has spoken against this.
But there's more...
The article features an anecdote about photos of Jarvis' four-year-old girl. Jarvis claims these photos were shared online.
The problem (and one of the reasons I'm so bothered) is that the photo that was shared was an artificially generated image from ThisPersonDoesNotExist. Jake Lahut would have been able to discern that had he done LITERALLY ANY research.
If you know me and the work I've done, you'll know why this is infuriating.
The article has features lies that Jarvis likes to frequently tell about other disinformation researchers. Lies that have prompted his followers to "faildoxx" people.
In published DM's, Jarvis rails against Jared Holt, Mike Rothschild, and The Daily Beast's Will Sommer.
Jarvis believes they're all operatives working to keep QAnon alive.
Why would Jake Lahut platform Jarvis AFTER seeing that wall of nonsense?
Funny enough, Jake Lahut KNEW about Steven Jarvis prior. In a blog post about the article, Jarvis says that he talked with Lahut for weeks and shared 3 phone calls. Apparently, nothing registered as a red flag.
Yet in a DM with @conspirator0, Lahut says "I know Jarvis is a mess with his keyboard activism".
Jake Lahut knew what he was getting into. He did it anyway.
The Daily Beast needs to retract this story and apologies to all of the parties involved.
When the article crossed my radar about a day after it's publishing, I thought I'd reach out to a few of The Daily Beast's writers to see if they had thoughts. Not a peep.
I thought I might try to reach out to EIC Tracy Connor. Not a Peep.
I wrote to EVERY possible Daily Beast email I could find... Tips, Editorial, Press... Not a peep.
They want this to go away. It won't.
This is Gateway Pundit levels of bad journalism and accountability will be inevitable.
Lahut calling Jarvis a "disinformation researcher" is like calling Marjory Taylor Green an expert peace negotiator.
Stunningly stupid.
Unfortunately, I'm familiar with the insanity ... but, it's good to have the link here in case anyone else needs the info (so, thank you!).
EJ Gibney
Virginia Murr