If the show gets sued for what's being broadcast, then the lawsuits would take money from the company. By keeping it "bare bones", then lawsuits can't do much damage as he can file for bankrupcy and the value of the suits will be scaled down.
>>> Alex Jones, founder of InfoWars, was found liable for damages in a trio of lawsuits last year filed after he falsely claimed that the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre was a hoax
Doesn't sounds like a crime?
Defamation is not a crime, but it is a "tort" (a civil wrong, rather than a criminal wrong).
-- https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/defamation-law-made-....
Libel is criminal in 24 states.
-- https://www.aclu.org/issues/free-speech/map-states-criminal-...
My understanding of the judgement [1] is that he didn't follow the law at all w.r.t. court proceedings and so lost on that route. Which is not to say that he would've won the actual lawsuit but just he lost on technical grounds before it got to the emotional grounds.
[1]: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21074090-pozner-judg...
But realistically the situation is probably quite complicated with actual harms that can be demonstrated.
mikeryan's comment (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31070389) includes a link to an actual complaint.
There would be a big difference between Jones saying "the shooting was fake, it was a hoax" versus "that father on screen, John Smith, is a liar and an actor and doesn't even have a kid plus he's probably a pedo".
Well, which is it? What did Jones actually say about Sandy Hook? That seems to never get reported.
It gets reported all the time. It's both. Jones has said the shooting was fake/hoax, and Jones has called the parents liars and actors and said that they were making up the shooting for financial gain. In other words, libel.
Jones basically ignored court orders and wasn’t forthcoming in his responses to requests so the plaintiffs basically got a summary judgement without it going to trial. The only trial left is a judgement on damages.
The plaintiffs claim that Alex Jones was `not` voicing his opinion.
#9 in the Sandy Hook complaint (https://drive.google.com/file/d/12mHNXnFQo2nH555yJxC5JIEEeAo...) is ...
"Alex Jones does not in fact believe that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax -- and he never has."
Do you have evidence that Alex Jones' did, in fact, have the belief that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax, at the time he made the statements?