Supporters of QAnon on former President Donald Trump’s social media platform celebrated what they see as his renewed embrace of the conspiracy theory last week after he shared a meme seen as one of his cheekiest nods to QAnon yet.
The meme Trump shared on Truth Social included an illustration of him wearing a “Q” on his lapel and two QAnon slogans — “The storm is coming” and “WWG1WGA” (Where We Go One, We All Go). A few days later, he held a rally in Youngstown, Ohio, where he delivered part of his speech to music that sounded almost exactly like a QAnon-related song. As he did this, a group of his supporters in the crowd began pointing skyward in unison.
“As soon as we saw this, we realized we might have a problem,” a Trump aide told CNN. The former president’s team spent hours online after the rally trying to figure out what the salute meant and where it might have come from, sources said.
Some thought the crowd pointing one finger (index) to the sky was about Trump’s “America First” platform, said a Trump aide who spoke to CNN on condition of anonymity. Another said they thought it referred to “God First,” while others thought it might be an allusion to the QAnon slogan, “where one goes, we all go.”
Even among academics and experts who monitor QAnon and other online misinformation, the answer to what it all means remains unclear. they had never seen this one finger salute before.
But the post was hailed on Truth Social by conspiracy theorists, who believe in the existence of an evil cabal and see Trump as their hero.
“At this point, anyone who denies that Q was a legitimate business connected to the Trump administration is in deep denial,” read a post on a QAnon-supporting Truth Social account that has 120,000 followers.
Trump seems to be linked to QAnon issues in the past. But some aides, who were not authorized to speak publicly, have dismissed concerns about their boss’s behavior as the silly social media retweets of a boomer.
His group also continued to use a song at recent rallies after some of his aides became aware that it had connections to QAnon in early August.
Trump aides believe the former president reposted the meme not because it was referring to QAnon, but because it was styled like a “Game of Thrones” poster, pointing out that it resembled a poster Trump had brought to a cabinet meeting as president .
Perfect or not, some experts say what Trump is doing is dangerous. “What we have is a former President, a potential candidate for the presidency of the United States, legitimizing what is essentially a cult,” said Greg Erie, a former FBI special agent who now works with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL ). he told CNN on Tuesday.
The FBI warned last year about the potential for QAnon to incite violence, and some people involved in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol wore or carried QAnon paraphernalia.
Trump has previously shared memes akin to QAnon — often retweeting conspiracy theorists when he was president before stepping away from Twitter. Asked about QAnon in 2020, Trump replied, “Well, I don’t know much about the movement, other than they like me a lot.”
The former president is known to quickly post to his Truth Social account, often without carefully vetting the accounts he’s uploading or the content, according to a person close to Trump. “The QAnon stuff is way over his head,” a Trump adviser claimed, describing a widely held view in his orbit.
Another person who spoke with Trump recently told CNN, “I’ve never heard him talk about Q, and I can’t imagine he’s a supporter or even knows much about it.” However, the person said, Trump’s aides “pushed him away from things like that.” Trump’s team has a policy of asking supporters at his rallies to remove QAnon-themed shirts and posters once inside.
But Trump has refused to outright disavow the movement, which the FBI has warned is dangerous.
And while major social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have implemented policies since 2020 banning explicit QAnon content, Trump-era conspiracy theory thrives on Truth Social.
“I think his burden is to avoid that kind of nonsense,” said another Trump ally.
As for the song Trump played at his rally last Saturday night that has been linked to QAnon, Trump spokesman Taylor Budowitz publicly dismissed concerns about the music as “a pathetic attempt to create controversy and divide the America”.
But privately over the weekend, Trump’s team wanted to know his background.
There seem to be two versions online of all but identical songs. One, named after the QAnon catchphrase “WWG1WGA” and available on Spotify, is by an artist named Richard Feelgood. Another, titled ‘Mirrors’, is by a reputable composer. Trump’s team says it sourced the song from the latter, using stock music software.
The song was first used by the Trump team in a surveillance video at the Conservative Political Action conference in Dallas in early August. The video’s score was pulled from a music service called Storyblocks by an assistant looking for “dark” and “epic” tunes, a person familiar with the music selection told CNN. Another source said it was chosen after hours of listening to royalty-free songs for the right fit, adding that the song never went through any kind of vetting process before being used in the video.
Some Trump aides became aware of the QAnon connection in early August after seeing an article by The Daily Beast that identified the connection to Feelgood’s release.
However, they continued to use it. Trump shared a video on Truth Social where the music accompanied campaign footage, then played it at a rally in Pennsylvania earlier this month for dramatic emphasis during his final remarks.
While an aide noted that a small group of supporters raised their fingers during that rally in Pennsylvania, the group didn’t think much of it. Trump was thrilled with the impact of the music under his speech, and the song made his next appearance in Ohio, where the crowd’s reaction went viral last Saturday.
