Donald Trump’s QAnon fans are not giving up hope that he will be reinstalled in the White House this year, with a new theory that has them planning on celebrating his inauguration on March 4th.j
According to a report from Vice, the latest theory being passed around by right-wing extremists is based upon writings from members of the fringe “sovereign citizen” movement and a unique interpretation of American history.
As the Vice report notes, “Sovereign citizens believe that a law enacted in 1871 secretly turned the U.S. into a corporation and did away with the American government of the founding fathers. The group also believes that President Franklin D. Roosevelt sold U.S. citizens out in 1933 when he ended the gold standard and replaced it by offering citizens as collateral to a group of shadowy foreign investors.”
“Over the weekend, QAnon groups on Gab and Telegram, where most QAnon supporters have found a home since they were kicked off Twitter and Parler was de-platformed, commenters have been sharing documents describing the 1871 act, claiming it proves that Trump will be sworn in on March 4,” the report states. “The source for this date is the fact that 1937 was also the year when inaugurations were changed from March 4 to Jan. 20 — to shorten the lame-duck period of outgoing presidents. QAnon followers believe that Trump will become the president of the original republic, and not the corporation that they believe the 1871 act created.”ADVERTISING
The belief that Trump might bolster the hopes of the QAnon followers who have been despondent that President Joe Biden wasn’t arrested on January 20th.
A deeper explanation of this latest theory — and its genesis — can be found below:
This is how prophesy cults often work. For instance:
If the past has taught us anything it is that failed prophecies and frustrated predictions don’t always mark the beginning of the end for radical social movements.
In addition to being a historic event, one might be forgiven for thinking that the inauguration of President Biden and Vice President Harris would sound the death knell of QAnon conspiracy theories. Now that Biden is actually president and QAnon predictions about Trump’s continuing hold on power have failed to come to fruition it would seem logical that they would pack up shop and admit that they were wrong. But if history has taught us anything it is that failed prophecies and frustrated predictions don’t always mark the beginning of the end for radical social movements. With apologies to Madonna, it’s prophets who are the mothers of reinvention.
In the early 19th century, New York farmer and Baptist preacher William Miller preached that the return of Jesus Christ was imminent. His prophecy was based largely on his study of the biblical book of Daniel. His interpretation led him to conclude, initially at least, that Christ would return sometime between March 1843 and 1844. When March 1844 passed without the appearance of Christ and his angels in the sky, Miller picked another date —April 18, 1844—which also slid by without cosmic incident or divine intervention. A follower of Miller’s, Samuel Snow, proposed a third date in October, but the Day of Judgment had still not arrived. The Millerites were understandably disillusioned. One member, Henry Emmons, wrote that he had to be helped to his bedroom, where he lay “sick with disappointment.”
You would think that three false prophecies, collectively known as the Great Disappointment, would be the end of the Millerites. To be sure, some members did leave to join the Shakers, but others began to reinterpret the prophecies about the end of days. One group began to argue that they were only partly wrong. The prophecies weren’t about the Second Coming and end of the world but, rather, about the cleansing of a heavenly sanctuary. It wasn’t an earthly event, it was a heavenly one, and this explained why, to us mere humans, it might appear that nothing had happened. It was out of this group that the Seventh Day Adventist Church arose. Today the Seventh Day Adventist Church has between 20-25 million members. They are, according to Christianity Today, “the fifth largest Christian communion worldwide.”
Update: John Amato caught a new Q defender on Fox News
Monday night, Tucker Carlson went on a rant about how the Democratic Party is trying to “control your thinking” because they are denouncing the insane QAnon conspiracies, and nobody is stopping them.
The Fox News host played a series of clips from other cable networks discussing the disaster caused by these conspiracy theory nuts. Trump used QAnon crazies to promote his failed presidency and his crazy voter fraud lies. As long as the QAnons were defending him, Trump was happy to give constant retweets of their preposterous ideas.
Carlson focused on a Tom Friedman quote when he said that QAnon conspiracy theorists were “frightening.”
Tucker agreed, “And he’s right. but not, as usual, as he thinks.”
Tucker claims that society is profoundly “changing right before our eyes” and the proof is in the denouncing of a batsh*t crazy Republican conspiracy theory movement.
“The threat is from an idea. It’s called Qanon,” Carlson said.
Tucker tells his rubes that if he doesn’t defend QAnon, then tyranny will prevail over our democracy.