Accounts spreading that message included Johnny MAGA, a pro-Trump X account that had nearly 300,000 followers. The anonymous account shared a clip from the White House’s official instant reaction feed, claiming, “They’re burning the American flag in Minneapolis right now.” “And they actually expect you to believe that ICE shot an innocent civilian.”
To his audience, Johnny MAGA looked like an independent voice, just another angry supporter in the MAGA media ecosystem. The account regularly promotes Trump’s Truth Social posts and bats for the administration, attacking Democrats like California Governor Gavin Newsom.
But this is not just a regular account. It appears that Johnny MAGA is actually a White House staffer named Garrett Wade who works as a rapid response manager for the Trump administration, helping run the same White House account that his anonymous MAGA account promotes. According to a WIRED review of publicly available records, a phone number linked to Wade is linked to JOHNNY MAGA, and the connection was confirmed by a source close to the White House.
Wade and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
According to its X profile, the Johnny MAGA account was created in September 2021. (According to records reviewed by WIRED, it originally used a different handle, which referred to Wade’s birth year.) While the account’s earliest available posts focused on NFTs, it has had a consistent pro-Trump presence since at least 2022.
The operator of the JOHNNY MAGA account has not disclosed any official affiliation with the White House while operating the JOHNNY MAGA X account. Several media outlets, including Mother Jones, Townhall, and the New York Post, have linked posts on the Johnny MAGA account as an organic reflection of public sentiment on political issues.
Since Trump took office last year, the Johnny MAGA account has supported administration priorities like immigration enforcement and allies like Turning Point USA. After Trump posted a racist AI-generated video depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes earlier this month, the Johnny MAGA account promoted the White House’s claim that the President did not watch the entire video, posting, “The most obvious thing is that Trump’s Truth Social post was not intentional in that if he had seen it he would have posted the entire thing. This is a masterpiece.”
While the Trump administration has long cultivated a growing cast of conservative creators to spread its message online, a White House staffer moonlighting as an anonymous MAGA influencer will further blur the already blurry line, making it nearly impossible to distinguish between official government messaging and what appears to be organic digital support. Disinformation researchers suggest that lack of disclosure risks undermining public trust.
“People have a right to know who is trying to manipulate public opinion, and they have a right to know whether they are experiencing astroturf politics,” says Samuel Woolley, a University of Pittsburgh professor who studies disinformation and media ethics. “The lack of transparency and conflict of interest associated with this account and lack of disclosure amounts to a breach of the public trust.”
There is little public information online about Wade, but Federal Election Commission records link him to a former senior White House communications lead. Donations from 2023 through WinRed by Garrett Wade of suburban Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – where Wade graduated from high school – listed his employer as a “tech school” in March 2023 and as Opinion Architects, a digital consultancy group, in December of the same year. According to public records, the donation also lists Wade as living in the Bucks County area of Pennsylvania, where he previously lived. The phone number associated with Wade and Johnny MAGA – which in the past has listed its location as Philadelphia – is also located in the Bucks County area.
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