By Dietrich Knauth
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Gateway Pundit, a far-right news site, filed for bankruptcy Wednesday, following litigation by election workers and others who faced harassment after the site made false claims that the 2020 U.S. election was stolen.
Gateway Pundit founder Jim Hoft said in a statement that the bankruptcy filing was the result of "progressive liberal lawfare attacks" meant to "silence" his company.
"This is not an admission of fault or culpability," Hoft wrote. "This is a common tool for reorganization and to consolidate litigation when attacks are coming from all sides."
Hoft said the Gateway Pundit would continue to publish during its bankruptcy.
TGP Communications, Gateway Pundit's corporate name, filed for Chapter 11 protection on Wednesday evening in Florida. The company's petition estimated that it had between $500,000 and $1 million in assets.
The Gateway Pundit emerged as a major player in the far-right media universe by bolstering former president Donald Trump's false stolen-election narrative with coverage that generated outrage and helped increase its audience.
The Gateway Pundit faces lawsuits by people who allege they received numerous threats after being vilified in false stories. One of the lawsuits was filed by Ruby Freeman and Wandrea "Shaye" Moss, Georgia election workers who recently won a $148 million defamation verdict against former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani.
Lawyers for Freeman and Moss could not immediately be reached for comment.
Defamation lawsuits have driven several right-wing figures into bankruptcy recently.
Giuliani filed for bankruptcy protection in December, days after the $148 million judgment was entered in the Georgia election workers' lawsuits, and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones filed for bankruptcy in 2022 after facing $1.5 billion in defamation judgments stemming from his repeated lies about the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school massacre.
A Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing automatically pauses lawsuits against a debtor, and may be used to wipe out debts and legal judgments, but it has not protected Jones.
A U.S. bankruptcy judge ruled in 2023 that Jones could not use his bankruptcy to avoid paying the Sandy Hook families that sued him, finding that the majority of the judgments were the result of "willful and malicious injury" caused by Jones.
(Reporting by Dietrich Knauth; editing by Leigh Jones and Bill Berkrot)
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