Gateway Pundit, an online media outlet that is repeatedly cited and praised by President Trump and those in his inner circle, smeared a Canadian mosque just days after a terrorist shooting attack left six Muslim worshipers dead and eight wounded on January 29 by making dubious claims that the mosque has “strong ties to terrorism.” 

The alleged shooter, identified as 27-year-old white student Alexandre Bissonnette, was known for “far-right views” and had expressed support for anti-immigrant groups and figures, including Trump. He has been described as a “very right-wing and ultra-nationalist white supremacist” by people who knew him. 

In the immediate aftermath of the massacre, Gateway Pundit reported that the shooter had yelled an Arabic phrase in an attempt to insinuate the shooter was Muslim. The outlet went on to attack media outlets who had not reported this unconfirmed information. After the original attempt to smear Muslims fell apart, the outlet switched tactics and responded to the tragedy by attacking the mosque with a headline using all-caps styling on “MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD” and “TERRORIST” and asserting that it “has strong ties to terrorism.” Meanwhile, a search for the shooter's name using Gateway Pundit’s search function returns zero results.

The report cited by Gateway Pundit to prove links to terrorism claimed that the mosque was tied to the Muslim Brotherhood due to its founding by local members of the Muslim Student Association, a frequently maligned Islamic student organization located in colleges and universities across the United States and Canada. However, there is no evidence that the Muslim Brotherhood and Muslim Student Association are “actively affiliated,” and the only link between the two is the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood “helped establish the [Muslim Student Association] more than 50 years ago.” 

Adding to the concern of the often absurdly wrong Gateway Pundit is that its influence has greatly risen under Trump, with owner Jim Hoft announcing on January 19 that the outlet would have its first correspondent in the White House. Trump himself regularly tweets at or about the outlet, including praising it “for reporting the truth.” Numerous members of his team such as counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway and White House director of social media Dan Scavino Jr. have also tweeted about the outlet, as well as Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr.