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Right-wing personality Jacob Wohl appears to have faked death threats against himself and submitted them to police as evidence that he was facing “terroristic threats,” according to newly released documents.
Wohl and fellow provocateur Laura Loomer went to Minneapolis last month to “investigate” whether their quest to prove that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) married her own brother—a charge based on flimsy blog comments that has been disproven.
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Wohl’s videos to his fans were premised on the idea that Minneapolis is an incredibly dangerous place, and often featured him wearing a bulletproof vest. At one point in a new video about their trip, Wohl goes to a Minneapolis police station to report death threats he says he and his team have received since being in the city.
One of those threats came via direct message from a Twitter account called @Drakehomes612, who described himself as a Minneapolis “diversity coordinator.”
“I hope you fuckin know that if [I] bump into you in Dinkytown or anywhere else in my city I’m going shoot you and shit on your fucking bodies,” the account wrote to Wohl’s team. “Get that fuck out my city you piece of shit. Now.”
But @Drakehomes612 isn’t a real account. As journalist Tony Webster first noticed, @Drakehomes612 is one of the fake accounts Wohl created in the run-up to his Twitter ban. A source familiar with Wohl’s fake accounts confirmed to me that @Drakehomes612 was run by Wohl before being deleted by Twitter. That means Wohl was sending himself fake death threats, presumably in an attempt to up the drama during his Minneapolis videos.
Wohl submitted the faked messages to police as proof that he was facing “terroristic threats” via Twitter. The faked messages threatening to “shit on your fucking bodies” were included in a packet of police documents related to the case issued on Wednesday by the Minneapolis Police Department.
This isn’t Wohl’s first brush with controversy. In 2017, he became the youngest person to receive a lifetime ban from futures trading. Last year, he was involved in a scheme to smear Special Counsel Robert Mueller with sexual assaults allegations. Months later, the accuser Wohl had lined up told USA Today that Wohl had made all of the allegations up.
Loomer, who didn’t go to the police station, said she wasn’t involved in the report. Wohl didn’t respond to requests for comment. But he’s already lost one of his top allies on the right.
Activist Ali Alexander, who organized Wohl’s trip to Minneapolis and went with him to the police station, posted a video early Wednesday morning trying to distance himself from Wohl. Alexander claims that Wohl showed the faked direct messages to the police.
In the documentary, Alexander compares Wohl to both Batman and Iron Man. But now, he’s backing away fast, saying Wohl may be a “bad actor.”
“I don’t know what’s going to happen, but man, it doesn’t involve me, and I’m pretty excited about that,” Alexander said.
Alexander went on to suggest that his issue with Wohl isn’t that he lied, but that he did it in a clumsy way.
“It confirms that he’s not operating at a level where there’s useful misinformation, but kind of stupid, vanity-filled, ego-fueled disinformation,” Alexander said. “And that won’t look good for Jacob.”
Alexander distanced himself further from Wohl in an interview with The Daily Beast on Wednesday. Alexander, whose name is also on the police report, said he didn’t know whether or not Wohl faked the messages. But he said he’d be happy to work with police if they decide to investigate Wohl.
“If they do, I can’t wait to cooperate,” Alexander said.
