Ben Garrison

Benjamin R. Garrison (born 1957) is an American political cartoonist and artist often considered part of the alt-right. Several of Garrison's cartoons have been controversial; critics have called him sexist, racist, xenophobic, and conspiratorial. Some alt-right activists and Internet trolls have edited Garrison's comics to incorporate further offensive content, including the antisemitic "Happy Merchant" caricature (actually by Nick Bougas).

In a 2015 interview with Breitbart News, he said he did not support any presidential candidate in the 2016 United States presidential election, but said he admired Trump for "shaking up the neocon-controlled Republican Party." Garrison has described himself as a libertarian. As a boy, he lived in Bremerton, Washington, moving with his family to San Angelo, Texas, in 1972 when his father retired. Garrison first began drawing when he was a child. During university, he worked in a bakery and made donuts. In 1984, Garrison began working as an artist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer until that newspaper switched to an online-only format in 1997. Garrison and his wife moved to Montana in 2009, and shortly after that, inspired by the 2008 financial crisis and the subsequent bank bailouts by the Bush and Obama administrations, he began drawing political cartoons after a 20-year hiatus. Garrison is often linked to white supremacy and antisemitism, resulting in him being falsely included on a list of Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members by Anonymous. In 2014, Garrison spent more than 100 hours trying to remove libel on the Internet, but said it was "like trying to sweep the tide out with a broom." The cartoon showed a "scowling, masculine and dowdy" Obama contrasted against a smiling and feminine Trump, with the caption "Make the first lady great again!". Mic called the cartoon "Antifeminist".

Garrison's cartoons have lampooned several figures for their positions on the COVID-19 vaccines. In December 2021, Garrison drew a cartoon of Trump on the "Big Pharma Vaccine Bandwagon" being booed by his supporters. In January 2023, cartoonist Scott Adams announced that he was considering taking legal action regarding a Garrison cartoon about his views on vaccines. As Garrison's cartoons became more widespread, they have been regularly edited online including by Advance New Zealand and critics of the Bharatiya Janata Party and Indian National Congress in India.

Aside from political cartoons, Garrison does Cubo-Futurist paintings. For several years, he was represented by Bigfork's ARTfusion gallery, until Internet trolls began harassing the owners of the gallery.

On July 7, 2019, Garrison was invited to the White House for a "Social Media Summit", In July 2020, Garrison sued the ADL for defamation claiming the situation over the 2017 comic cost him "embarrassment, humiliation, mental suffering, anguish, injury to his name and professional reputation." Garrison was seeking $10.35 million in damages from the ADL. One of ADL's defences was that a Virginia court had no jurisdiction, as it was domiciled in the District of Columbia. The suit was ordered dismissed on April 15, 2021, after the parties had stipulated and agreed to dismissal of the action with prejudice, with each party to bear its own costs.

Personal life Garrison married Christine (Tina) Norton, an artist and illustrator, in 1982.