Jonathan Majors Sparks Backlash With Controversial Anti-Islam Speech in Daily Wire’s ‘Run Hide Fight: Infidels’

Jonathan Majors has spent the better part of two years trying to rebuild his career following his 2023 assault conviction, taking on projects designed to prove he can still headline a major film. Earlier this year, that comeback effort included a notable return to theaters with ‘Magazine Dreams,’ a role that earned him some of the more measured coverage he’s had in some time.

His next project is shaping up to be a far more polarizing one. Majors has signed on to star in ‘Run Hide Fight: Infidels,’ a standalone sequel produced by Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire that has already generated significant controversy since its premise first became public earlier this year.

That controversy escalated further this week with the release of an exclusive clip showing Majors’ character delivering a lengthy monologue about Islam to a college audience. In the scene, his retired Delta Force officer claims that Muslims desire death and warns that immigration and reproduction will be used as tools to defeat the West, rhetoric that immediately drew condemnation from Muslim advocacy organizations.

The film centers on Majors’ character, Clay Saunders, a Delta Force veteran who returns to a college campus that has been seized by radical Islamic terrorists posing as pro-Palestinian protesters. According to the film’s synopsis, the militants attempt to impose Sharia law and execute anyone they deem an “infidel,” setting up a violent standoff between the terrorists and a group of students who team up with Saunders to fight back.

After reviewing a transcript of the scene, two of the country’s most prominent Muslim advocacy organizations didn’t hold back in their response to The Hollywood Reporter. Sue Obeidi, senior vice president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council’s Hollywood Bureau, described the project as the anti-Muslim fantasy of Ben Shapiro and Daily Wire, a characterization she shared in comments reported by The Hollywood Reporter.

Obeidi argued that the film leans on outdated and inaccurate tropes about Muslims, and expressed hope that audiences would see through the messaging rather than spend their time on it. Edward Ahmed Mitchell, national deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, was similarly critical, framing the project as propaganda and suggesting it reflects Shapiro’s broader disconnect from mainstream American audiences.

This isn’t the first time ‘Infidels’ has drawn fire. Since its trailer first debuted this summer, critics have accused the film of conflating pro-Palestinian activism with terrorism and reviving post-9/11 anti-Muslim stereotypes, with some outlets going so far as to call it openly xenophobic in both marketing and execution.

Producer Dallas Sonnier hasn’t shied away from that characterization, previously embracing descriptions of the film as provocative and unapologetic about casting radical extremists as its villains. That willingness to lean into controversy has made Majors’ involvement in the project a central part of the conversation surrounding his broader return to the industry.

The film marks a standalone sequel to 2020’s ‘Run Hide Fight,’ which centered on a school shooting hostage situation and premiered at the Venice Film Festival to a far quieter reception. ‘Infidels’ takes a markedly different approach, trading a contained thriller premise for something explicitly tied to current geopolitical tensions and campus protest movements.

Whether the backlash will meaningfully affect the film’s reception once it reaches audiences remains to be seen, but the reaction from advocacy groups suggests ‘Infidels’ isn’t likely to fade quietly into the background. For Majors, a role this politically charged adds yet another layer of scrutiny to a comeback that was already being watched closely.

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