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Welcome back to False Flag! The far-right groyper community is in chaos, after yet another leading “groyper general” under the tutelage of white nationalist podcaster Nick Fuentes has been busted by his rivals for having a decidedly nontraditional sexual past.
Prominent groyper social media star William Sexton—who goes by the name “Vrillium” on Instagram, where he has 163,000 followers—was exposed over the weekend for social media posts made around 2020. In those tweets, Sexton talked about his experiences with gay sex and posted pictures of himself both nude and in women’s clothing.
While that may be a no-no for the groyper community, uncommon sexual predilections are par for the course for many on the far right. But what interested me was Sexton’s contention that the dirt was dug up by supporters of Vice President JD Vance. Sexton didn’t exactly have proof of this. Instead, he noted that he had recently criticized Vance in racist terms for having an Indian-American wife. “Captive Dreamer,” a pro-Vance racist account the vice president has interacted with before, certainly exulted in Sexton’s downfall.
This isn’t the first time that a significant fight on the right has turned into a proxy war over Vance’s position in the 2028 primary. At Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest conference earlier this month, Tucker Carlson claimed the controversy over his friendly interview with Fuentes was just an attempt by moderate Republican forces to tie Vance to Fuentes through Carlson.
Do we really have to deal with three more years of roiling right-wing feuds that double as shadow wars over JD Vance’s future presidential campaign? It seems likely. And False Flag will be there every step of the way. Become a Bulwark+ member to support my reporting on this world, which gets more twisted every day:
–Will
Trump Admin Scores Visa for Founder of Russian Propaganda Outlet
Tenet Media’s Lauren Chen is back—even though the illegal-influence and money-laundering investigation remains open.
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RIGHT-WING MEDIA PERSONALITY Lauren Chen left the United States in July in disgrace. Her Tenet Media YouTube channel, which positioned itself as a sort of MAGA supergroup bringing together such popular commentators as Tim Pool, Benny Johnson, and Dave Rubin, had been exposed in 2024 by the FBI as a Russian media front illicitly taking money from pro-Putin propaganda outlet RT.
The September 2024 indictment from the Southern District of New York targeted Tenet’s FARA-skirting Russian funders, not Chen or her husband, Liam Donovan. But the Canadian couple were clearly described in the indictment as allegedly scheming with RT employees to direct $10 million to Tenet and even create a fictional persona to mislead one pundit about the source of the funding.
In the wake of the indictment, Chen lost her work visa and was forced to leave the country. She also vanished from social media. It seemed unlikely she would return to the United States anytime soon.
But this holiday season, Chen and her husband were back in Nashville, where she lived while running Tenet. She broke the news herself, by announcing on Instagram and X on Christmas Day that she could now return to the United States, and specifically thanking the State Department’s Joe Rittenhouse, a senior adviser on consular affairs and former Trump presidential campaign worker, for his help.
“The biggest thank you to Joe Rittenhouse at the State Department for moving mountains to ensure we were able to return in time for the holidays!” Chen wrote on Instagram.
Chen also thanked Customs and Border Patrol, the FBI, and “the administration” broadly.
“Also the utmost gratitude to CBP, the new leadership at the FBI, and the administration for their help making this possible, and for everything they do to keep America safe,” she wrote.
Rittenhouse himself confirmed the administration’s effort to help Tenet Media’s founders return to America in a post on X, wishing Chen a “merry Christmas.”
“This Christmas I’m so happy to help correct the wrongs of the past administration,” he wrote. “Being able to bring Lauren and her family back for Christmas would not be possible without new Leadership at the Whitehouse, FBI, CBP, and State Department.”
Rittenhouse does appear to be a fan of right-wing media. In August, he posted a picture with his feet up on a desk in what appeared to be a government office building, watching a video from right-wing British YouTuber “Sargon of Akkad.”