Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and Roger Stone, a conservative pundit who has advised President Donald Trump for decades, visited a shooting range to fire weapons in preparation for a civil war in the event Trump is removed from office.
The visit was documented in a nearly one-and-a-half-hour-long December 19 video posted to Jones’ YouTube channel with the title “Roger Stone Prepares For Civil War After Trump Is Removed From Office: LIVE AUTO GUNFIRE.”
Jones set up the video by explaining that when Stone “was recently asked by TMZ what happens if Trump is assassinated or overthrown, he said it would cause a civil war.”
Asked to spell out his comment to TMZ, Stone, who is a contributor to Jones’ Infowars website, said, “We do not advocate violence or foment violence, but if there is a coup d’etat, if there is an illegitimate unconstitutional effort to remove Donald Trump on trumped-up charges by a biased and partisan prosecutors (sic) or an illegitimate takedown by the 25th Amendment, there will be a civil war in this country.”
“The Trump constituency has been awakened and they will not be put to sleep,” added Stone. He then said that he was at the shooting range to practice self-defense for himself and his family, but also to “defend the Constitution” if it is necessary.
Jones and Stone then entered the shooting area and fired an array of semi-automatic and fully automatic firearms, including one equipped with a silencer. At one point, Stone violated a basic safety rule by putting his finger on the trigger of an Uzi submachine gun before he was ready to shoot, causing the instructor to repeatedly remind Stone to take his finger off the trigger before physically removing it. Stone also remarked that he couldn’t see where the safety was because of the glasses he was wearing. While firing the weapons, Stone and Jones joked about shooting “commie dogs” and making a “JFK throat shot,” and Jones joked that Stone is “our Rambo” to “take on the globalists.”
On his program, The Alex Jones Show, Jones has repeatedly and baselessly claimed that there is a plot by Democrats, globalists, and other forces to violently overthrow the Trump presidency, which would lead to a bloody second American civil war. While talking about the prospect of a civil war, Jones frequently indicates his willingness to personally participate in violence, including serving as an executioner for convicted traitors. In other contexts, Jones has also raised the spectre of violence, including threatening to “beat” a Democratic congressman’s “goddamn ass” and discussing his willingness to take up arms in a race war.