Sources: social network SafeChat, which SimilarWeb says had 900K visitors last month, is a rising MAGA and anti-CCP hub, has undisclosed ties to The Epoch Times
Politico : Tweets: @joncoopertweets , @politico , and @oneunderscore__ Tweets: Jon Cooper / @joncoopertweets : As Trump supporters flock to alternative social media, many are turning to SafeChat, a platform known for its tolerance of MAGA content. It's a hotbed of conspiracy theories & disinformation that paints the Biden administration in the worst possible light. https://www.politico.com/... @politico : The fast-growing social network SafeChat has close ties to The Epoch Times, the right-wing media outlet affiliated with Falun Gong https://www.politico.com/... Ben Collins / @oneunderscore__ : The Epoch Times continues to do extremely normal stuff! https://www.politico.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
SafeChat is the newest node in a migration path that has been forming since January 2021, when far-right users began leaving Facebook and Twitter for platforms like Telegram amid crackdowns by the mainstream networks. Politico's sourcing matters because it names the operator behind one of those destinations: The Epoch Times, which had already run an undisclosed network of YouTube channels pushing election disinformation without disclosing the connection.
The undisclosed-affiliation pattern is the throughline — audiences are routed to 'alternative' spaces that are in fact adjacent to established media organizations. With SimilarWeb pegging SafeChat at 900K monthly visitors, it has enough scale to matter in the contest among alt-platforms, where right-wing personality follower counts surged after January 6 but have since stalled — meaning new entrants are fighting over a largely fixed pool of users.
First-order effects
- The Epoch Times gains a disclosed-in-name-only distribution asset: Politico's report converts what was an implicit advantage into a named affiliation, putting the outlet's role in platform ownership on the record.
- MAGA and anti-CCP users seeking refuge from mainstream moderation get a new landing spot, while advertisers and researchers tracking election disinformation gain a specific target with measurable traffic.
Second-order effects
- SafeChat now competes directly with Truth Social, Gettr, and Gab for the same stalled-growth user base — Truth Social's own content-moderation inconsistencies suggest none of these platforms has solved the trust problem, so differentiation will come from affiliation and perceived safety from takedowns rather than product quality.
- The disclosure angle invites the scrutiny that hit Telegram: once a platform is identified with an organized political-media operation, researchers and regulators treat its growth numbers as influence metrics rather than organic adoption, echoing how Twitter dismantled a China-based influence campaign spanning nearly 2,000 accounts ahead of the midterms.
Third-order effects
- If undisclosed media-organization ownership of social platforms becomes a recognized pattern — Epoch Times' YouTube channels, now SafeChat — expect calls for ownership-transparency rules for social networks, treating undisclosed affiliation as a governance defect comparable to bot networks.
- The structural shift is toward vertically integrated political media: outlets that produce content also owning the distribution layer, insulating their audiences from any platform-level moderation decision made elsewhere.
The trend: Right-wing media organizations are extending from content production into platform ownership, building moderated-refuge social networks whose affiliations surface only through investigative reporting.