Add The New York Post on Google He’s losing his connection with reality.
Days after getting booted from his family’s $1.75 million Virginia mansion, the Cornell University student who declared he’s “not interested in working for a Jew” is losing his mind over a new enemy: a 5G cell tower.
In a bizarre Aug. 2 rant on X, Austin Franco claimed a mysterious 5G box outside the window of his new Ithaca, NY, pad is blasting harmful radiation right into his brain.
“My head has been ringing for the past hour and I have a massive headache,” Franco, 19, whined in the midnight post.
“The ping on this is already 10x the normal limit and went almost 500x at one point.”
The rising junior then asked if anyone in the area had a room to spare for him to crash in, because he “won’t be staying here much longer.
“Will just have to eat the cost. And figure out something in the meantime. I guess that’s what happens when [you] can’t test these places out ahead of time.”
Franco launched a GiveSendGo donation page on July 29, begging for cash after he announced that his parents evicted him from their home due to his “repugnant” views.
He’s already raised over $10,000 from his twisted supporters — on top of the roughly $26,000 he’s raked in from a separate fundraiser titled, “Fund Austin Franco after Jewish doxxing,” created by far-right English YouTuber Miles Routledge.
“Our oppression as free white men and women calling it out for what it is ends now. His parents are too stupid to see that he is right! We are being attacked,” wrote one donor, who gifted the rising junior $100.
Lee Whitnum — the 2018 Connecticut Democratic gubernatorial candidate who was dragged off stage and arrested for crashing a forum she wasn’t invited to also forked over $100 for Franco.
Whitnum, an outspoken anti-Zionist, said she related to Franco because she was slammed as antisemitic by former Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy while he was the mayor of Stamford.
“Mayor Dannel Malloy appeared on tv to call me antisemitic and deranged. I had never made any comments about Jews, about Israel – absolutely,” said Whitnum, who also made failed bids for Senate and House seats.
“And, FYI you have every right to work for whom you want.”
Since delivering the antisemitic message to VryfID’s Jewish co-founders Gabe and Aiden Einhorn via job board site Handshake in June, Franco has embraced being a hater.
Franco’s parents previously told The Post that their son has fallen victim to “extremist online content,” and that his sick beliefs are entirely his own.
“The internet can absolutely speed up radicalization. If you’re surrounded day after day by people telling you your anger is righteous and your enemies deserve contempt, your view of what’s normal starts to shift and warp,” psychotherapist Jonathan Alpert, author of “Therapy Nation,” told The Post.
Start your day with all you need to know Morning Report delivers the latest news, videos, photos and more.
“But we also shouldn’t let ‘the algorithm made me do it’ become the new version of ‘the devil made me do it.’”
It’s despicable that Franco can collect a single cent, he noted.
“One of the ugliest features of the internet is that almost anything can be monetized, including hate. When people send money to someone after they’ve become notorious, they’re doing more than helping financially. They’re rewarding the bad behavior,” Alpert said.
