![]() ![]() SOMMER: Yeah, so certainly I think people cycle in and out of QAnon. ![]() ![]() So what are the QAnon followers' thoughts about Trump now? GROSS: Do they still have that kind of faith in Trump 'cause after all, he was president for four years? We don't all live in peace. But they see him as a guy who, you know, will almost bring in a utopian world where diseases are cured and there's no war and we all live in peace. And yet they see him as a guy who will not just, you know, set America right or restore American values or what have you, whatever they might believe that to be. It is a guy who in some ways seems so venal and is such a slave to sort of his basest instincts, you know, whether it's his ego or sexual gratification or greed. I think in terms of why QAnon believers see Donald Trump as, as you say, a messianic figure - it is baffling. So, I mean, that is how deep their admiration and adulation for him runs. Some of them call him the God emperor of the United States. It was kind of like the second coming or something, and I just can't understand why, of all people, Trump became this messianic figure. He was somebody who was going to right all the wrongs in the world and turn the world into a more utopian place. GROSS: Trump to QAnon believers - at least when he was president - was a savior. So I had that sense of this really unsettled anger that QAnon had caused that ultimately did help end up driving the riot. And when someone they thought was Mike Pence pulled up, they freaked out and started really yelling about QAnon. And when I was there before the riot happened, I realized how many QAnon believers were there, and they were chanting QAnon slogans. For QAnon believers like her, it's metaphysical. And ultimately, she would face charges for her role in the riot. I mean, she saw this really as a struggle between good and evil and that she was a soldier on its front lines. So as a QAnon believer, Teresa didn't just think that, you know, electing a Republican president means she'll have Supreme Court justices she likes or lower tax rates. As you say, it was a physical struggle with Satan and a fight for the soul of the world. GROSS: And so this wasn't just about who would be president. She said that she was there because she believed that world elites keep children in tunnels where they drain them of their blood - they call them mole children - and that she believed that, you know, the sort of the greatest forces in the world were committing horrible crimes against children and that there had to be this kind of climactic moment that she believed would be that day. But because she was a QAnon believer - and she was holding a giant Q on a staff maybe twice her height - she said she wasn't just there to, you know, see Trump reinstated or see him get another four years or disrupt the vote count. ![]() I spoke with a woman named Teresa (ph) who had come from the Midwest to come out to D.C. So I spoke with a woman - and this is before the riot happened. So just go through what this one person told you about why they were there to give back the presidency to Trump. You quote what one of them told you, which pretty well sums up a lot of the craziest of the QAnon beliefs. You were outside the Capitol speaking to QAnon followers. Sommer is a political reporter for The Daily Beast and co-host of the podcast "Fever Dreams." Sommer says he has an unusual passion for consuming huge amounts of right-wing media after having been raised in a conservative Texas family where road trips meant listening to Rush Limbaugh's talk radio show. His reporting has made him a target of QAnon, making it essential for him to wear disguises when he shows up at their rallies. He's been following QAnon from its very beginning and was writing about the far right even before that. It's just the start of the all-consuming conspiracy theory movements to come. These are among the questions journalist Will Sommer deals with in his new book, "Trust The Plan: The Rise Of QAnon And The Conspiracy That Unhinged America." He warns that QAnon isn't a one-time phenomenon. How did that become a foundational belief of QAnon? How did it reflect and add to the antisemitic beliefs of this conspiratorial group? How did QAnon enter mainstream politics? This substance called adrenochrome is a liquid fountain of youth that will help keep the users alive. A substance with special, energizing qualities that can only be found in the brains of children who have been sexually tortured in satanic rituals is harvested from children and distributed to top Democrats, Hollywood celebrities and bankers in the cabal. ![]()
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