YOUTUBER Jake Paul, who denied claims that he called Covid-19 a hoax, was caught in an audio recording calling the virus exactly that.
Paul made the comments in an interview with Marlow Stern, an entertainment reporter for The Daily Beast, and then tried to claim that he was “misquoted.”
Stern, however, had the evidence. He released an audio recording of Paul making comments about Covid-19’s effect on the economy.
Paul, 23, can be heard saying that he “100 percent” believes that the economy should be re-opened, despite Covid cases spiking at alarming rates across the US.
“There are people losing jobs, there are small businesses going bankrupt, there are millions of people who are unemployed right now,” Paul said.
“People are turning to alcohol and drugs to cope with everything that’s going on. This is the most detrimental thing to our society.
“Covid cases are at less than 1 percent, and I think the disease is a hoax,” he added.
When Stern asked the YouTuber to clarify, noting that the virus has “killed about 260,000 people so far this year,” Paul incorrectly claimed, “so has the flu.”
In another interview with The Verge on Friday, Paul attempted to walk back on the claims.
The YouTuber-turned-boxer was making the press rounds ahead of his Saturday boxing match against former NBA star Nate Robinson.
When asked about the Covid hoax claims, Paul blamed Stern for publishing “something that’s false.”
“This reporter, he misquoted me,” Paul claimed. “He took what I said out of context, and I told him that.”
“It’s quite upsetting actually that someone with that sort of power can just publish something that’s false,” he later added.
“And then just everyone would conceive it to be true when reading it.”
However, the tape seems to suggest the claims weren’t false after all, as does Paul’s previous behavior in regards to Covid restrictions.
He caught serious heat over the summer – even getting called out by the mayor of Calabasas, where he lives – for hosting a massive party at his mansion in July.
Neighbors were fuming after reporting that Paul held the party mid-pandemic with many guests, few masks and no social distancing.
In response to that controversy, Paul claimed that he was, “not gonna sit around and not live” his life.
