YouTuber Nick Shirley says he’s been unfairly persecuted for his Trump-friendly work as an “independent journalist” because people “came after” him and his family—by asking him questions.
Shirley, 23, became a viral sensation for the MAGA right, including FBI Director Kash Patel and billionaire Elon Musk, after making a video that claimed to expose "Minnesota’s Billion Dollar Fraud Scandal."
The video quickly blew up among MAGA figures and Trump allies, with Vice President JD Vance publicly hailing the influencer as having “done far more useful journalism” than the winners of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize. But Shirley’s claims in the video—which conveniently aligned with President Trump’s frequent attacks on Minnesota’s leaders—soon fell apart under scrutiny. The widespread fraud that he was claiming to expose had already been reported on and investigated long before he showed up. Last year alone, over 70 people in the state were charged with misusing government funds connected to food programs at child-care centers.
Even after the claims made in his video were thoroughly discredited, Shirley went on a victory lap.
Speaking to fellow conservative podcaster Shawn Ryan on his eponymous show, released Thursday, Shirley accused “legacy media” of “fraud” for questioning his story.
“It’s just complete fraud for them to come after me. Like, I actually never even gave my opinions on the Internet,” he griped. “However, my hand was forced to start giving my opinions because they came after me. They came after my family. They doxed. They doxed my entire family.”
Ryan, who fawned over Shirley throughout the interview, pressed for more details, asking, “How did they come after you? Be specific.”
“Well, they tried to come after me. They tried to debunk all, my, my whole entire story. They then…," he spluttered before Ryan cut in. “Who’s they?” he asked.
“All the news,” said the self-styled independent journalist, who has no formal journalistic training. Urged to “just get more specific,” Shirley said, “CNN, CBS...”
“Who’s the reporter?” Ryan demanded.
“I don’t even know her name because she’s irrelevant. Nobody knows who she is,” he said of an interview with CNN’s Whitney Wild.
In the street interview, Wild asked Shirley for more details on his “investigation” into a Minnesota daycare center, pointing out that the center’s door being locked and staffers refusing to let Shirley in was not unusual for a facility entrusted with the care of young children. In her resulting report, Wild said CNN is looking into Shirley’s claims. She also noted that there have been at least 80 people indicted and at least 56 convicted in connection with fraud in the state, stretching back to the early days of Joe Biden’s administration.
Shirley said he ended up coming across well in the CNN report, in his opinion. Ryan said he hoped to see the legacy media “f---ing die.”
“It will be a glorious death,” he said.
