The Republican Party is currently under siege from a far-right conspiracy group called “QAnon.” The foundation of their beliefs is that people in Hollywood and the Democratic Party (specifically Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and George Soros) are part of an illegal child sex trafficking ring and are part of this deep state that seeks to overthrow Donald Trump and his supporters. This alleged deep state also worships Satan according to some QAnon supporters.
Over the last couple of weeks on Facebook, I have seen some of my conservative friends post about illegal child sex trafficking and how it is such a pervasive problem in our society. I don’t doubt that some of it goes on and that it’s an incredibly disturbing, evil practice. But, I was also wondering why my conservative friends were all latching onto this particular issue. Their posts reeked of possible conservative conspiracy theory propaganda BS, but I couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. When I learned about QAnon, I was like “Aha! This is probably the source.”
What’s even more alarming is that we will likely start seeing QAnon supporters in congress. Marjorie Taylor Greene, an avid QAnon supporter who has spouted racist remarks about African-Americans, Jews, and Muslims, won the GOP primary seat in Georgia’s 14th Congressional District. A district that is heavily Republican.
It will be interesting to see how the Republican Party will navigate this since many Republicans in congress are already starting to distance themselves from this lunacy. At the same time, Donald Trump has embraced QAnon and tweeted enthusiastic support for Greene upon her victory in the GOP primary. So, there’s a delicate balance that the Republicans feel they have to play even though the obvious answer is to call out QAnon for the quackery that it is.
The best thing that can happen is for Trump to lose to Biden in November in an overwhelming defeat. This will send a strong message that Trumpism failed and that anything related to it is also doomed for failure. If Trump wins in November, that will only add more fuel to the fire for QAnon and other future conspiracy theories/groups that are certain to follow.
(Photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)