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Conservative podcasters respond to Russian influence allegations
Three prominent podcasters have insisted they had no knowledge a US network hosting their content allegedly received nearly $10 million from Russian state media employees seeking to influence the 2024 presidential election.
Tim Pool, Benny Johnson and Dave Rubin all strongly denied any wrongdoing and described themselves as “victims” of the purportedly Moscow-backed scheme.
According to a Department of Justice indictment, an unidentified Tennessee-based company received nearly $10 million from two employees of RT, a media network owned by the Russian state.
CNN said it had “independently confirmed” that the company was Tenet Media, a content creation platform that hosts shows for Pool, Johnson and Rubin.
The indictment claimed the scheme was created to “recruit unwitting American influencers” who would promote Kremlin sympathetic narratives ahead of November’s presidential election.
A statement on the leaked DOJ indictment today:
A year ago, a media startup pitched my company to provide content as an independent contractor. Our lawyers negotiated a standard, arms length deal, which was later terminated. We are disturbed by the allegations in today’s…
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) September 4, 2024
In a statement posted on X, formerly Twitter, Pool wrote: “Should these allegations prove true, I as well as the other personalities and commentators were deceived and are victims. I cannot speak for anyone else at the company as to what they do or to what they are instructed.”
He added: “That being said, we still do not know what is true as these are only allegations. Putin is a scumbag, Russia sucks donkey b****.”
Johnson wrote: “A year ago, a media startup pitched my company to provide content as an independent contractor. Our lawyers negotiated a standard, arms length deal, which was later terminated. We are disturbed by the allegations in today’s indictment, which make clear that myself and other influencers were victims in this alleged scheme. My lawyers will handle anyone who states or suggests otherwise.”
Rubin commented: “These allegations clearly show that I and other commentators were the victims of this scheme. I knew absolutely nothing about any of this fraudulent activity. Period.”
Newsweek contacted Tenet Media for comment outside of regular working hours.
This is a breaking story. More to follow.
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See TSA Wait Times at Major U.S. Airports
Travelers are facing long waits at airport security checkpoints as the partial government shutdown continues to strain staffing for Transportation Security Administration workers. About 50,000 T.S.A. personnel have been working without pay for over a month, and hundreds have quit or called out of work.
On Monday, President Trump deployed Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to some U.S. airports, saying that they would help ease long security lines. By Monday afternoon, the lines at the Atlanta, LaGuardia and Newark airports had become so long that those airports removed wait time estimates from their websites. Atlanta’s airport advised passengers to allow for at least four hours for security screenings.
Here are the latest available wait times at select major airports across the country.
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See wait times at airports across the country
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Suspect in slaying of Loyola University student was in the country illegally, officials say
A Chicago man arrested for allegedly gunning down a Loyola University student was in the country illegally and captured in part because of his “distinct” limp, officials said Monday.
Sheridan Gorman, 18, was killed shortly after 1 a.m. Thursday near Tobey Prinz Beach Park, less than a mile from campus, police said.
Jose Medina, 25, was arrested Friday night and booked on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and other gun-related charges in connection with the fatal shooting of Gorman, who was from the New York City suburb of Yorktown Heights.
Medina’s scheduled court appearance on Monday was delayed after the defendant was taken to the hospital, prosecutors said. The nature of Medina’s injury or illness was not immediately disclosed.
The suspect wore black clothes and a black mask when he allegedly shot Gorman in the back in the early morning hours of Thursday, according to a Chicago police arrest report released on Monday.
Witnesses described and nearby security cameras showed the suspect “walking with a distinct limp and slow gait,” according to the report.
Cameras then caught Medina entering his apartment house on N. Sheridan Road, and a building engineer identified the suspect as a resident, the police report said.
Medina had been previously “apprehended by U.S. Border Patrol and released into the country,” according to a Department of Homeland Security statement.
The suspect was released again on June 19, 2023, following a shoplifting arrest in Chicago, federal officials said.
Gorman was “failed by open border policies and sanctuary politicians,” DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis said in a statement.
The report didn’t make clear what, if any, motive the suspect might have had for the attack.
“We are gravely disappointed by the policies and failures that allowed this individual to remain in a position to commit this crime,” a statement from Gorman’s family said.
“When systems fail — whether through release decisions, lack of coordination, or unwillingness to act — the consequences are not abstract. They are real. And in our case, they are permanent,” the family said.
It wasn’t immediately clear on Monday if Medina had hired or been appointed a lawyer to speak on his behalf.
Gorman’s slaying could take center stage in the nation’s ongoing debate on immigration in the same manner as Georgia nursing student Laken Riley’s murder in 2024.
The suspect in her slaying, Venezuelan citizen Jose Antonio Ibarra, illegally entered America in 2022 near El Paso, authorities have said.
The Trump administration frequently invokes Riley’s name in its justification of mass deportations and other anti-immigration actions.
Riley’s family has asked that their loved one’s name not be used in this public debate.
“I’d rather her not be such a political, how you say — it started a storm in our country,” father Jason Riley told NBC’s “TODAY” show a month after his daughter’s death, “and it’s incited a lot of people.”
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new video loaded: Plane Collides With Vehicle at LaGuardia Airport
By Jiawei Wang
March 23, 2026
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