Ken Klippenstein (born February 1, 1988[1][2]) is an American journalist who formerly worked at The Intercept.[3][4] Prior to joining The Intercept, Klippenstein was the D.C. Correspondent at The Nation[5][6][7] and previously a senior investigative reporter for the online news program The Young Turks.[8] His work has also appeared in The Daily Beast,Salon, and other publications.[9] His reporting focuses on
U.S. federal and
national security matters, as well as corporate controversies.[10]
Klippenstein graduated from
Wheaton College in 2010 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature.[14][15]
Career
Klippenstein's early journalism career began in
Madison, Wisconsin.[16] His work with The Young Turks started as early as 2018.[17] In 2020, Klippenstein joined The Nation as their D.C. correspondent.[18] On April 30th, 2024, Klippenstein announced on his
Substack newsletter that he was resigning from The Intercept and would primarily work on Substack.[4]
Use of the Freedom of Information Act
Klippenstein is a self-described "
FOIA nerd"; much of his journalism draws on information he has uncovered from records requested at state and national levels of the US government.[19]
His articles also frequently include information from
leaked documents.[20] He obtained leaked documents from the PR firm
Qorvis, which implicated the company pitching the private company
Caliburn on a propaganda video in order to improve the reputation of Caliburn's Homestead, a Florida shelter for "unaccompanied alien children".[21][22] In an April 2020 article, Klippenstein reported on a leaked document showing that the
Pentagon had warned the
White House in 2017 about the risk of shortages and ill-preparation for a
pandemic brought on by a
novel coronavirus such as
SARS-CoV-2.[23][24] Klippenstein, along with Talia Lavin and Noelle Llamas, successfully sued the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.[25] In December, 2020, he filed two new FOIA lawsuits: one against the U.S. Department of Justice[26] and the other against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Department of State, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Defense Intelligence Agency, Office of Intelligence and Analysis, U.S. Department of Energy, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.[27]
During the
George Floyd protests, Klippenstein's reporting uncovered documents regarding federal policing of the protests. Specifically, Klippenstein obtained an FBI document that stated the Washington Field Office "has no intelligence indicating Antifa involvement/presence" during DC-area protests in contradiction to
Attorney General William Barr and other officials' assertions that
Antifa were specifically responsible for instigating violence.[28] He also reported that contacts working at the
Department of Homeland Security were disgruntled about orders to generate internal intelligence reports on journalists covering protests in
Portland, Oregon as well as participating activists.[29][30]
Later, he co-authored with
Lee Fang an article published by The Intercept in October 2022 regarding leaked documents exposing Department of Homeland Security's plans to secretly police disinformation online.[31][32] In response, Klippenstein was interviewed on Useful Idiots, where he expressed concern about what he saw as a major media failure regarding intelligence information oversight in a situation with no one in control as things drift toward disaster.[33]
On August 9, 2023, Klippenstein authored an article published on The Intercept regarding information Klippenstein obtained via FOIA requests about "[t]he star witness of Congress’s UFO hearings,
David Grusch," and Grusch's history relating to
PTSD, depression, suicidal thoughts, and alcohol use.[34] On August 10, 2023, during an interview with Breaking Points, Klippenstein stated that he spoke with both "
DoD people and intelligence people" while working on his article; Klippenstein described his sources as "mid-level people," who are "experienced, but didn't quite have the political chops generally to quite make it to the top."[35]
Online pranks
According to The Daily Beast, Klippenstein "has a history of pranking unknowing targets on Twitter."[36] Klippenstein has occasionally been the subject of reporting, as well, due to him pranking individuals from across the political spectrum. Following a
Twitterflame war with
Tesla CEO Elon Musk, he attracted Musk's attention by sharing a Vogue photograph from the 2014 Vanity Fair Oscars afterparty showing Musk with
Ghislaine Maxwell, a long-time associate of the late convicted sex offender
Jeffrey Epstein, who had been
convicted of sex trafficking.[37] Musk, who as of June 3, 2020, had 35.5 million Twitter followers,[38]publicly posted that Klippenstein was a "
douche-about-town."[39] On January 9, 2024, he and other journalists were abruptly banned from
X, the platform formerly known as Twitter and which Musk now owns. No explanation was given.[40] Klippenstein and the other journalists were later reinstated following media coverage of the incident.[41]
In July 2019, Klippenstein was covered in the media after a Twitter incident in which he was retweeted by
Iowa Congressman
Steve King just before changing his Twitter display name to "Steve King is a
white supremacist".[42][43][44] In March 2021, Klippenstein pranked author
Naomi Wolf by recommending she tweet an
image of a fabricated
anti-vaxxer quotation paired with a picture of American pornography actor
Johnny Sins.[45]
On Memorial Day 2021, Klippenstein tricked political commentators
Dinesh D'Souza and
Matt Schlapp, as well as
Florida Congressman
Matt Gaetz, into retweeting a photograph of
John F. Kennedy's assassin
Lee Harvey Oswald, whom Klippenstein claimed was his veteran grandfather.[46] After being retweeted by Gaetz, Klippenstein changed his display name on Twitter to be "
matt gaetz is a pedo". Gaetz later deleted his retweet.[47][48]