Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has ordered a senior U.S. Justice Department official to drop an inquiry into a retired FBI agent's involvement in a defamation lawsuit involving Alex Jones' conspiracy theories about the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, a person familiar with the matter said Wednesday.
Ed Martin Jr., who leads the Justice Department’s “weaponization working group,” sent a letter dated Sept. 15 to the Sandy Hook families' lawyer asking for information about former FBI agent William Aldenberg, who responded to the 2012 school shooting and was a plaintiff in the lawsuit, along with victims' relatives, that led to a $1.4 billion judgment against Jones for calling the massacre a hoax.
Martin's letter suggested that he was looking into whether Aldenberg broke a federal law by receiving financial benefits for helping to organize the lawsuit. Jones, who said he met with Martin last week in Washington, has accused Democrats and Justice Department officials of orchestrating the lawsuit to silence him.
But Martin's correspondence to Christopher Mattei, a lawyer for the Sandy Hook families, and Aldenberg, "caused frustrations” within the Justice Department, and Blanche directed Martin to withdraw the letter, said the person familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal agency matters.
Mattei said he received a new letter from Martin on Wednesday that said there was no investigation of Aldenberg and “I hereby withdraw my request for information.”
“Less than 18 hours after calling out Alex Jones and Ed Martin for their corrupt use of the Department of Justice to harass Sandy Hook families and the heroic FBI agent who ran into that school to save any children he could, I am happy to learn that this so-called inquiry has now been withdrawn, if it ever existed at all,” Mattei said in a statement.
Martin, who has been examining President Donald Trump’s claims of anti-conservative bias inside the Justice Department, has sent letters to a host of targets in other, unrelated matters, seeking information or making appeals. But it is unclear whether such requests have amounted to anything.
Jones posted a copy of the Sept. 15 letter on his X account Tuesday, saying “Breaking! The DOJ’s Task Force On Government Weaponization Against The American People Has Launched An Investigation Into The Democrat Party / FBI Directing Illegal Law-fare Against Alex Jones And Infowars.”
The school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, on Dec. 14, 2012, killed 20 first graders and six educators. Jones, based in Austin, Texas, repeatedly called it a hoax and pushed false claims that it was staged by crisis actors in an effort to increase gun control. The Infowars host later said he believed the shooting was “100% real.”
At the 2022 defamation trial in Connecticut, Aldenberg and relatives of many of the victims testified about being subjected to threats and abuse by people who believed Jones' conspiracy theories about the shooting.
Aldenberg was among the law enforcement officers who responded to the school, and he broke down while testifying during the trial about finding dead children and teachers.
Aldenberg did not respond to messages left at a phone number and email addresses listed for him in public records.
Jones recently asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his appeal of the $1.4 billion judgment. He also is appealing a $49 million judgment in similar lawsuit in Texas filed by two other parents of a child killed in Newtown. He has cited free speech and press rights in both cases.
He filed for bankruptcy in late 2022. The Sandy Hook plaintiffs are now trying to liquidate Infowars’ assets in state court proceedings in Texas. Some of Jones' personal belongings also are being sold as part of the bankruptcy case.
Martin has been serving as head of the Justice Department’s “weaponization working group” since his nomination for top federal prosecutor in Washington was pulled amid bipartisan concerns about his modest legal experience and his advocacy for Jan. 6 rioters.
Attorney General Pam Bondi created the group to scrutinize matters in which conservatives have claimed they were unfairly targeted or treated.
Martin was also recently named a special prosecutor to help conduct the separate mortgage fraud investigations into Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James and U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff.
