A right-wing broadcaster with a history of making perceived anti-Semitic statements — including one where he called the impeachment of Donald Trump a “Jew Coup” — has been granted an official White House press credential to cover the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where the president delivered an address on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, CNN reporter and host Jake Tapper confirmed via Twitter that Rick Wiles of the “end times” site TruNews was given the White House credential.
In a TruNews online broadcast last October , Wiles threatened that Trump’s supporters — including “veterans, cowboys, mountain men,” and “guys who know how to fight” — would bring “violence to America” and “hunt down” Democrats if the president was removed from office.
“We just want to thank President Trump and the White House,” the host said in a YouTube video recorded at Davos this week, acknowledging the grant of a press credential to TruNews , as quoted by Right Wing Watch .
In his broadcast last November in which Wiles blamed Trump’s impeachment on “Jews,” the host said that “this is a coup led by Jews,” aimed not only at removing the president but at removing “you and me.”
“When Jews take over a country, they kill millions of Christians,” Wiles said in the November video.
The Davos forum is not the first time that the TruNews site has received credentials from the Trump White House. During a press conference in September 2018, the president took a question from Wiles’ co-host Edward Szall, who had been credentialed to be part of the White House press corps, according to Gizmodo .
Szall asked the president a question about “this great deal, the peace deal” between Israel and the Palestinians. But Trump did not answer the question directly, instead veering into a discussion of his personal relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his claim that he has built a new United States embassy in Jerusalem for only $500,000.
Gizmodo noted that the TruNews outlet has broadcast alarming warnings that “commandos in the employ of Jews and LGBTQ people are preparing to assault the White House and decapitate Trump and his family.”
Right Wing Watch describes Wiles as “deeply anti-Semitic,” noting that many of his broadcasts are dedicated to “railing against Israel and Jews.”
However, Wiles and his co-hosts are now among those covering Trump’s appearance at Davos, where, one day after Tuesday’s speech, he said in an interview that he is now open to cutting social security and Medicare . As previously reported, such a move would effectively reverse one of the key promises of his 2016 presidential campaign.