On
his latest podcast episode on Thursday, Joe Rogan took aim at protesters in Portland, Ore., calling their clashes with police “madness.” For further evidence, he pointed to the massive forest fires tearing through Oregon this month.
“They’ve arrested left-wing people for lighting these forest fires,” he said on “The Joe Rogan Experience” to his millions of listeners. “You know, air-quote, ‘activists.’ This is also something that’s not widely being reported.”
That’s not true, according to
both the FBI and
local law enforcement in Oregon. In fact, those agencies have urged people to
stop spreading claims that antifa members are starting fires, warning that the misinformation is
hampering efforts to battle the wildfires and fueling a
dangerous surge of vigilantism.
“Conspiracy theories and misinformation take valuable resources away [from] local fire and police agencies working around-the-clock to bring these fires under control,” the FBI
said last week in a statement. “Please help our entire community by only sharing validated information from official sources.”