Meet The Onion's new and improved InfoWars

When news broke in 2024 that The Onion was trying to acquire InfoWars at bankruptcy auction, comedian Tim Heidecker had one thought: "That would be fun to have to play with." He reached out to The Onion, heard nothing back, and assumed he'd been passed over. Then, out of the blue, they called. By July 2nd, 2026, Heidecker was launching as creative director of a relaunched InfoWars — a satirical reclamation of the conspiracy empire built by Alex Jones, who was ordered to pay $1.5 billion to the families of Sandy Hook victims for defamation.

The three-phase plan

Heidecker's vision for the new InfoWars unfolds in stages. Phase one is direct parody: a show called Emergency with Tim Heidecker that mimics Jones's manic style, complete with the strained vocal cords and conspiracy rhetoric about crisis actors and demonic forces. But Heidecker knows that pure imitation has a short shelf life. "That to me doesn't have a long shelf life," he says. Phase two would evolve into something broader: a platform for the kind of comedy Heidecker and his collaborators actually want to make — the sort of stuff that doesn't fit neatly into The Onion's established voice. Phase three, presumably, is a sustainable media business.