Is QAnon winning at the box office? Variety reported that's what some critics are saying about the success of Sound of Freedom, a faith-based thriller about child trafficking, after it took in $40 million during its first six days of release. The movie's defenders say that its success proves that Hollywood all too often overlooks the potential of films that appeal to religious conservatives. That accomplishment "reflects a demand by an underserved audience who are hungry for entertainment that reflects their values and beliefs," said one analyst.

"However one chooses to slice it, Sound of Freedom has over-delivered on expectations in dollars and cents," Charles Bramesco wrote at The Guardian. The movie contains no explicit mention of QAnon — but it does seem to be "QAnon-adjacent." For one, it stars Jim Caviezel — best known for playing Jesus in The Passion of the Christ — who has a habit of promoting conspiracy theories about traffickers who harvest drugs from the glands of children. The themes are also strongly reminiscent of the Q conspiracy theory. Those unfamiliar with QAnon "may not pick up on the red-yarn-and-corkboard subtext" of the film, but for true believers, the movie is "a clarion call that leads right to the multiplex."

Those claims have seen pushback from conservative media outlets. Operation Underground Railroad founder Tim Ballard, whose organization inspired the film, went on Fox News to deny the QAnon associations. "Every show I've seen, they just like to throw the word out, QAnon," he said. "They make zero connection to the actual story."

'Moral panic' or realistic horrors?

On the surface the movie is a straightforward thriller, Sam Adams wrote at Slate. But it arrived in theaters in a "cloud of innuendo" by supporters "about who doesn't want this story to be told." And it is difficult to ignore Caviezel's press tour, in which he has discussed an alleged "black market where a barrel of children's body parts goes for a thousand times the price of oil." For all that, the movie is a "little nondescript," Adams wrote. "But that only makes it a better vehicle for other people's messages."

"It's not 'paranoid' or 'QAnon adjacent' to bring much-needed attention to horrors that are all too real," Madeline Kearns wrote at National Review. If the film fuels a "moral panic" about sex trafficking the result will be "at worst, wasted energy and a disproportionate use of resources." But it could turn out that Americans are underestimating the problem. The movie performs a valuable service by reminding us "as long as children are being abused … the rest of us ought to care."

"The exploitation of children is a real problem that no one (besides the exploiters) want," Rich Juzwiak wrote at Jezebel. What's more, Sound of Freedom is "well-acted, it looks expensive, and it moves at a rapid clip." But it's difficult to untangle the film from its right-wing associations, including endorsements from Elon Musk and Ivanka Trump. So of course the movie is designed to entice audiences. "I can't say I wasn't entertained in some way," Juzwiak wrote, and added: "That's how propaganda works."

Changing the movie business

The Wall Street Journal reported that the studio behind Sound of Freedom, Angel Studios, is looking to follow up on its success. While big studios increasingly rely on "big-budget crowd pleasers," others see "room to operate for releases targeting niche or underserved audiences." Another faith-friendly film — Jesus Revolution — grossed $52 million at the box office earlier this year. Sound of Freedom has an unusual business model: The studio crowdfunded the release, with 7,000 backers contributing as little as $10 apiece to ensure the movie appeared in theaters. "We realized that this black box that was the theatrical experience is now open to us," said studio president Jordan Harmon.

More than any lesson about sex trafficking, that business lesson might be the movie's most significant legacy. Expensive movies like the new Indiana Jones flick "must reach a blockbuster status to see any profit margins," Dhruv Sharma noted at Screen Rant. But Sound of Freedom was made for just $14.5 million. That means it "can break even without raking in as much revenue as bigger-budget movies."

Lara Logan, formerly a CBS News reporter and more recently a frequent Fox News guest, went so off-field on former Fox News host Eric Bolling's Newsmax show Wednesday night, Newsmax said she is no longer welcome on the right-wing network. Bolling brought her on to talk about immigration, and she ended up "pushing QAnon tropes, invoking blood libel, and fear-mongering about a 'global cabal' planning to 'dilute the pool of patriots' in the United States," The Daily Beast reports.

"Newsmax condemns in the strongest terms the reprehensible statements made by Lara Logan and her views do not reflect our network," Newsmax told The Daily Beast on Thursday. "We have no plans to interview her again."

Logan started her comments Wednesday by predicting the Biden administration is trying to engineer "a Reichstag fire" — an event the Nazis used to consolidate power and curtail liberties — then went on to claim she was shown a secret United Nations plan in which a "global cabal" would "dilute the blood of patriots" by importing 100 million immigrants, stating God knows "the open border is Satan's way of taking control of the world," and insisting Israeli intellectual Yuval Harari "and the rest of them at the World Economic Forum ... want us eating insects, cockroaches ... while they dine on the blood of children."

Fox News dropped Logan and scrapped her Fox Nation streaming show after she compared Dr. Anthony Fauci to a notorious Nazi doctor last year. Since then, The Daily Beast's Justin Baragona writes, "Logan has become increasingly associated with the QAnon community" and has "been openly peddling antisemitic tropes in recent months," often centered around "the Rothschilds."

"Conservatives often complain about being deplatformed," but "in this case, Logan has effectively been deplatformed by right-wing media outlets such as Fox News and Newsmax, two channels that often fuel complaints about the supposed censorship of conservatives," CNN's Oliver Darcy observes. "It shows that people like Logan are often exiled from platforms not for holding conservative views, but because they use their platforms in a grossly irresponsible way."

The Georgia Guidestones, a mystery-shrouded Stonehenge-like granite monument and roadside attraction in rural east Georgia, was destroyed Wednesday after an early morning blast reduced one of its four 19-foot-high granite panels to rubble. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation said the panel was damaged by an explosive device, and the entire monument was later demolished "for safety reasons" as investigators searched for clues to the vandal.

The GBI released surveillance footage showing the 4 a.m. explosion and a silver sedan driving away.

The Guidestones, outside Elberton, had attracted visitors but also conspiracy theorists since an anonymous patron, using the pseudonym R.C. Christian, paid for its construction in 1980. The four panels were inscribed with instructions for "the conservation of mankind" in 10 parts and eight languages, and the monument also served as a sundial and astronomical calendar.

"The inscriptions urge humanity to live harmoniously, rule fairly, and protect the environment," The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. "But further instructions to limit the world population to 500 million and establish a world court have attracted criticism from fringe groups who fear the rise of a one world government or other baseless conspiracies."

Interest in the monument grew after Kandiss Taylor, a Georgia Republican gubernatorial candidate, released a campaign ad in May pledging to destroy the Guidestones, which she linked to "the Satanic Regime," an apparent QAnon reference. Taylor, who came in third in the May GOP primary, tweeted Wednesday that God "can do ANYTHING He wants to do," including "striking down the Satanic Guidestones."

The destruction of the Guidestones shows that conspiracy theories "do and can have a real-world impact," Katie McCarthy, a researcher at the Anti-Defamation League, told The Associated Press. "We've seen this with QAnon and multiple other conspiracy theories, that these ideas can lead somebody to try to take action in furtherance of these beliefs." Right-wing personalities like Alex Jones had mentioned the Guidestones in years past, she added, but "they sort of came back onto the public's radar" because of Taylor.

Lee Vaughn, chairman of the Elbert County Board of Commissioners, agreed that Taylor's ad brought a lot of unwanted controversy, including from a pastor who came to a commission meeting from a neighboring county last month and talked for 20 minutes about the "evil" monument and why it should be removed. "Just thank goodness nobody was hurt," Vaughn told the Journal-Constitution.

The BBC has produced a podcast on QAnon called "The Coming Storm" in which journalist Gabriel Gatehouse attempts to understand why so many people bought into the conspiracy theory. "Where other series have tended to present QAnon followers as crackpots with a tenuous grip on reality, Gatehouse is respectful and maintains a curious rather than condescending tone," Fiona Sturges writes in the Financial Times.

Gatehouse and Jon Stewart dug into the topic on The Problem With Jon Stewart podcast, and they ended up in some unexpected places. If you take the main conspiracy theory points literally — Hillary Clinton and other global elites are in a cabal of blood-drinking pedophiles — "then obviously it's nonsense," Gatehouse said. "But if you take QAnon as a sort of parable," where a group of powerful actors are effectively running things behind the scenes, it makes more sense.

Stewart asked why QAnon followers would glom onto outrageous tales instead of that simpler populist argument. Gatehouse agreed that the "specificity" of Q's outlandish conspiracies helped it succeed where other LARP (live-action role play) "anon" accounts failed, but he also pointed to the "emotive" draw of child trafficking and QAnon's "participatory element." "People are deputized," Stewart said, and Gatehouse agreed, saying QAnon adherents "do their own research" and end up in bizarre places in their search for explanations on how they ended up "at the bottom of the pile."

Stewart suggested this search for "nefarious" scapegoats is in the same "universe" as the "the misinformation that the fascists used in the '30s" or even "the Salem witch trials," and Gatehouse said the big difference is that "the Nazis were in control of the message, but now we've got the internet, like, no one's in control of it." Right, "it's a crowdsourced misinformation campaign," Stewart said. He also suggested "the mainstream American media sowed the seeds for Q's virality by creating that adrenaline and cortisol in people's bodies of fear and always on the verge of disaster and catastrophe." Gatehouse agreed, they ended up talking about the apocryphal Donald Trump "pee tape."

Gatehouse also hinted at why the BBC might be interested in QAnon: "Well, you guys are always first, so wherever you go, we follow. So obviously the wheels are about to come off our democracy as well."

BBC correspondent Stephanie Hegarty also took a look at QAnon, and why it's so hard to quit.

Federal prosecutors asked a judge Tuesday night to give "QAnon Shaman" Jacob Chansley 51 months in prison for his "now-famous criminal acts" that "made him the public face of the Capitol riot" on Jan. 6. The four year, three month sentence would be the stiffest handed down yet for the Jan. 6 Capitol siege, and it's at the top end of the federal sentencing guidelines.

Chansley, who pleaded guilty to obstructing Congress from certifying President Biden's electoral victory, is only the third Capitol rioter charged with a felony to have reached the sentencing phase, Politico reports. Prosecutors recommended 18 months for defendant Paul Hodgkins, but a federal judge gave him eight months. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, who is handling Chansley's case, is scheduled to sentence the third felon, former MMA fighter Scott Fairlamb, on Wednesday; prosecutors have asked for 44 months in prison.

Chansley merits the longer sentence because he spent months before the riot spreading disinformation about the election, he publicly gloated and "showed no remorse in the days after the event," he carried a spear-tipped U.S. flag into the Senate chamber, and he repeatedly refused commands from police officers, prosecutors write in their 28-page sentencing memo.

"What should have been a day in which Congress fulfilled its solemn, constitutional duty in certifying the vote count of the Electoral College, ensuring the peaceful transition of power in our nation, was disrupted by a mob of thousands on Jan. 6, 2021," and Chansley "was, quite literally, their flag-bearer," the prosecutors write. He "was among the first 30 rioters to penetrate the U.S. Capitol building," and he "then stalked the hallowed halls of the building, riling up other members of the mob with his screaming obscenities about our nation's lawmakers, and flouting the 'opportunity' to rid our government of those he has long considered to be traitors."

Chansley's lawyer, Albert Watkins, has said a sentence "significantly below" the 41-51-month guidelines would be appropriate and noted that by the time he is sentenced, Chansley will have already spent 10 months behind bars.

"Folks, in case you were wondering what your insane aunt is up to, you don't have to wait till Thanksgiving," Stephen Colbert said on Wednesday's Late Show. "The latest in cutting-edge crazy is that hundreds of QAnon adherents gathered in Dallas, Texas, yesterday. The reason? They were expecting a big announcement from John F. Kennedy Jr.," who died 22 years ago. "Apparently the creme de la cray-cray believed that John-John faked his own death, went into hiding, and is now actually the Q that they follow on the internet," Colbert explained. "And they expected him to appear in public and reveal all of this yesterday in Dallas, at Dealey Plaza, by the grassy knoll. Oh, and they had to throw in the grassy knoll. Up till then it had the ring of truth."

"Shockingly, JFK Jr. did not show up in Dallas yesterday afternoon, due to his chronic case of NotAlive," Colbert said. "But the QAnon crowd didn't lose hope because rumors began to circulate that JFK Jr. would instead appear at a concert by the Rolling Stones that evening. Guys! Come on! You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes you might find, you just might find, you get what you need — which is medication."

When JFK Jr. failed to appear at the Stones concert, some intrepid QAnon believers proposed "that Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is in fact President John F. Kennedy," Colbert laughed. "Okay, that is crazy. President Kennedy would be 104 years old, and Keith Richards is clearly way older than that."

"It's crazy that people actually believe this — I mean, if you're gonna believe that a band is the dead Kennedys in disguise, wouldn't you assume that band was the Dead Kennedys?" Jimmy Kimmel asked on Kimmel Live. "The Illiterati gathered by the hundreds because they believed JFK Jr. and JFK Sr. were going to re-emerge and reinstall Donald Trump to power — because obviously the Kennedys would be big Trump fans," Kimmel deadpanned. "I cannot overstate how crazy this event — that is getting almost no coverage — was." Seriously, "how many times does Q have to be wrong before they realize he's just making stuff up?" he asked. "They don't even know who he is. Maybe I'm Q! ... It's not out of the question. If I was, this is exactly how I would do it."

Americans who attend church services at least once a month are more likely to view the QAnon conspiracy theory favorably than those who attend less frequently, an Economist/YouGov poll released Tuesday finds. On the other end of the spectrum, Americans who say they never go to church are the most likely to view QAnon unfavorably.

The Economist reports it was seeking to test two theories, one being that Americans "who have no religious affiliation find themselves attracted to other causes, such as the Q craze." The other, which has been posited by the likes of Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), is that "modern strains of Christian evangelicalism ... do not satisfy all worshipers," causing them to "find community and salvation in other groups, such as QAnon."

The findings suggest the first theory likely isn't the case, while the analysis of the second one is more muddled. Though The Economist and YouGov do have data on how frequently people attend church, the survey doesn't dive into how satisfied individuals feel with their church community. "It is not clear whether those who have a favorable opinion of QAnon do so because they want membership of a social group, as Mr. Sasse and others claim, or because they are merely more suspectible to conspiratorial thinking," The Economist writes.

The poll was conducted between July 10-13 among 1,500 American adults. The margin of error was 3 percentage points. Read more at The Economist.

An anonymous survivor of the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting says their own father has been convinced it was a hoax and has even falsely accused them of "being part of it."

A Reddit user recently posted on the QAnonCasualties subreddit that they are a survivor of the shooting in Parkland, Florida, but that their dad believes it was a hoax and the QAnon conspiracy theory has "consumed his life." On Monday, Vice spoke with the author of the post and confirmed their identity as a survivor of the shooting, which left 17 people dead in 2018. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity and was referred to only as Bill, which isn't their real name.

"Back in January he saw the video of Marjorie Taylor Greene harassing David Hogg ([another] student) about the shooting being a false-flag operation, and while my dad was already into Q, he'd never gone down that particular rabbit hole and now he's convinced everything was a hoax and it breaks my f---ing heart," the Reddit post said.

The user goes on to say that their father has directly claimed to them, "You're a real piece of work to be able to sit here and act like nothing ever happened if it wasn't a hoax. Shame on you for being part of it and putting your family through it too."

"Bill" told Vice that their last semester at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School was already "difficult enough with Feb. 14 marking 3 years since the shooting," but the fact that "my dad thinks the absolute hell we went through, where nine of the victims were in our class, is a hoax" has made matters worse, and he explained he hasn't shared this with his classmates because it's not a "pain I want to put on them."

After reports surfaced about antivirus software magnate John McAfee's death in a Spanish prison on Wednesday following the announcement that he was being extradited to the United States where he faced tax evasion charges, his social media team appeared to pull a "stunt" on his Instagram account, posting a "Q", likely in reference to the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory, NBC News' Ben Collins reports.

Per Collins, McAfee frequently alluded to global conspiracies and alleged he was being targeted while publishing attention-grabbing social media posts.

Meanwhile, Marc-André Argentina, a research fellow at the International Center for the Study of Radicalisation, pointed out that Jordan Wildon, who investigates digital disinformation, tracked down the exact time stamp of the post, which indicated "this was a planned post troll."

The FBI and the Homeland Security Department's intelligence office are warning that many adherents of the QAnon conspiracy theory have become disillusioned as the movement's false prophesies keep not materializing, and some of those followers will likely turn to violence, according to a report released Monday by Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).

One main tenet of the QAnon conspiracy was "The Storm," where former President Donald Trump would stay in power and his enemies in the "cabal" would be tried and executed. At least 20 of the people arrested for participating in the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection are QAnon followers, the report says. After President Biden won and took office, some QAnon adherents have come to believe Trump is the "shadow president," while others "likely will disengage from the movement or reduce their involvement" as Biden continues to be president.

A main concern, the two-page unclassified FBI report says, is that violent "adherents of QAnon likely will begin to believe they can no longer 'trust the plan' referenced in QAnon posts and that they have an obligation to change from serving as 'digital soldiers' toward engaging in real world violence — including harming perceived members of the 'cabal' such as Democrats and other political opposition — instead of continually awaiting Q's promised actions which have not occurred." Believing in QAnon is not in itself a violation of any law, the FBI underscores.

Heinrich and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) asked the FBI for its QAnon assessment in December. "QAnon refers to a complex and constantly evolving conspiracy theory that is promoted by a decentralized online community that has morphed into a real-world movement," the report explains. "Its foundational principle holds that a corrupt cabal of 'global elites' and 'deep state' actors run a Satan-worshiping international child sex trafficking ring, and engaged in plots to conduct a coup against a former president of the United States while he was in office." You can read the two-page memo at CNN.

President Biden has taken office, former President Donald Trump is in Florida, and the U.S. still hasn't seen a mass arrests of Democrats or a nationwide blackout.

All of these facts were shocking for some followers of the far-right conspiracy theory QAnon, as they thought and hoped that Trump would somehow seize permanent power on Wednesday, NBC News reports. But as Biden was sworn in without a hitch, QAnon message boards lit up with followers who realized a violent overthrow of the government wasn't about to happen, that Trump had no secret plans to somehow stay in office, and that they'd been wrong for months, if not years.

Even Ron Watkins, the administrator of the extremist message board 8kun who may have even originated QAnon, posted a last-ditch call for unity that didn't acknowledge the harmful conspiracy theories he'd allowed to spread for years.

Still, just as the many flaws in QAnon's past predictions failed to dissuade supporters, some believers are continuing to make excuses for Wednesday's events and suggesting some sort of overthrow is still possible.

A version of this article originally appeared in The New York Times. Used with permission.

A City Council member in Cali­fornia took the dais and quoted from QAnon, a pro-Trump conspiracy theory about "deep state" traitors plotting against the president, concluding her remarks, "God bless Q."

A man spouting QAnon beliefs about child sex trafficking swung a crowbar inside a historic Catholic chapel in Arizona, damaging the altar and then fleeing before being arrested.

And outside a Trump campaign rally in Florida, people in "Q" T-shirts stopped by a tent to hear outlandish tales of Democrats' secretly torturing and killing children to extract a life-extending chemical from their blood.

What began online more than two years ago as an intricate, if baseless, conspiracy theory that quickly attracted thousands of followers has since found footholds in the offline world. QAnon has surfaced in political campaigns, criminal cases, merchandising, and at least one college class. Last month, hundreds of QAnon enthusiasts gathered in a Tampa park to listen to speakers and pick up literature, and in England, a supporter of President Donald Trump and Brexit leader Nigel Farage raised a "Q" flag over a Cornish castle.

Most recently, the botched Iowa Demo­cratic caucuses and the coronavirus outbreak have provided fodder for conspiracy mongering: QAnon fans shared groundless theories online linking liberal billionaire George Soros to technological problems that hobbled the caucuses, and passed around bogus and potentially dangerous "treatments" for the virus.

About a dozen candidates for public office in the United States have promoted or dabbled in QAnon, and its adherents have been arrested in at least seven episodes, including a murder in New York and an armed standoff with police near the Hoover Dam. The FBI cited QAnon in an intelligence bulletin last May about the potential for violence motivated by "fringe political conspiracy theories."

Matthew Lusk, who is running unopposed in the Republican primary for a Florida congressional seat and who openly em­braces QAnon, said in an email that its anonymous creator is a patriot who "brings what the fake news will not touch without slanting." As for the theory's more extreme elements, Lusk said he was uncertain whether there really was a pedophile ring associated with the deep state.

"That being said," he added, "I do believe there is a group in Brussels, Belgium, that do eat aborted babies."

The seepage of conspiracy theorizing from the digital fever swamps into life offline is one of the more unsettling developments of the Trump era, in which the president has relentlessly pushed groundless conspiracy theories to reshape political narratives to his liking. In promoting fringe ideas about deep state schemes, Trump has at times elevated and encouraged QAnon followers — recirculating their posts on Twitter, posing with one for a photograph in the Oval Office, inviting some to a White House "social media summit." Recently, during a daylong Twitter binge, Trump retweeted more than 20 posts from accounts that had trafficked in QAnon material.

QAnon began in October 2017, when a pseudonymous user of the online message board 4chan started writing cryptic posts under the name Q Clearance Patriot. The person claimed to be a high-ranking official privy to top-secret information from Trump's inner circle. Over two years and more than 3,500 posts, Q — whose identity has never been determined — has unspooled a sprawling conspiracy narrative that claims, among other things, that Trump was recruited by the military to run for office in order to break up a global cabal of pedophiles, and that special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation would end with prominent Democrats being imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay.

The anonymous posts subsequently moved to 8chan, where they remained until August, when that site was taken offline after the El Paso, Texas, mass shooting. They now live on 8kun, a new website built by 8chan's owner.

Some QAnon fans are hardened conspiracy buffs who previously believed other fringe theories, such as the bogus claim that the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks were an "inside job." But many QAnon adherents are everyday Americans who have found in Q's messages a source of partisan energy, affirmation of their suspicions about powerful institutions, or a feeling of having special knowledge. Some are older adults who discovered the theory through partisan Facebook groups or Twitter threads and were drawn in by the movement's promises of inside information from the White House (some QAnon devotees even believe that Trump posts himself, under the code name "Q+"). Others are seduced by the movement's wild, often violent fantasies, including claims that Hollywood celebrities are part of a satanic child-trafficking ring.

In online chat rooms, Facebook groups, and Twitter threads, QAnon followers discuss the hidden messages and symbols they believe to be exposed in Q's posts, or "drops" — for example, because Q is the 17th letter of the alphabet, a reference by Trump to the number 17 is seen as a possible signal of his support for them.

They watch Patriots' Soapbox, a YouTube call-in show devoted to coverage of QAnon, and other niche media projects that have popped up to fill the demand for Q-related content. Reddit barred a cluster of QAnon groups from its platform in 2018, after a spate of violent threats from members, and Apple pulled a popular QAnon app from its app store. But other social platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, still host large amounts of QAnon content. In general, these platforms do not prohibit conspiracy theories unless their adherents break other rules, such as policies against hate speech or targeted harassment.

The frequent introduction of new symbols and arcane plot points to dissect and decipher has given QAnon the feel of a theological study group, or a massive multiplayer online game. In interviews, several adherents described QAnon as a "lifestyle" or a "religion," and said it had become their primary source of political news and analysis.

"It's more of a cult than other conspiracy theories," said Joseph Uscinski, a political science professor at the University of Miami who studies fringe beliefs. "QAnon is not just an idea; it's an ongoing thing that people can sort of get into and follow along with that keeps them entertained."

With its core belief that the president is heroically battling entrenched evildoers, QAnon may be the ultimate manifestation of Trump-inspired conspiracy mongering. From the start, it was inexorably bound up with "Make America Great Again" communities online: The New York Times found last year that some 23,000 of Trump's Twitter followers had QAnon references in their profiles.

But QAnon has steadily migrated offline to Trump campaign rallies, where dozens of supporters can be found with Q paraphernalia, carrying signs and commiserating about the theory. In recent months, QAnon adherents have complained that security officials keep people from bringing their gear into the rallies; the campaign said it permitted only approved signs and licensed merchandise at its events.

Harry Formanek, a 65-year-old retiree who attended Trump's Florida rally in November wearing a QAnon T-shirt, said he learned about the theory after hearing allegations that top Democrats were running a child-sex ring out of a Washington pizza parlor — the hoax known as "Pizzagate," which was something of a precursor to QAnon. Now, he said, he spends roughly an hour a day on QAnon-related websites and believes, among other things, that Trump signals his support with Q-shaped hand gestures during public appearances. "My friends think I'm crazy," Formanek said. "I mean, the proofs are just undeniable."

With its growth in popularity, QAnon's tangible presence is not limited to clothes, bumper stickers, and campaign signs, all of which can be found for sale on Amazon and at other retailers. The theory also showed up at Mesa Community College in Arizona, where an adjunct professor of English, Douglas Belmore, began working it into classroom lectures. He was fired last summer after students complained.

Belmore announced his dismissal on Twitter, saying, "Why aren't more professors, teachers, cops, pastors, and woke Americans everywhere NOT talking about this?" Later, he tweeted, "I pray that you see The Truth about POTUS and Q and their War against the trafficking of children," and posted a video clip of Trump at a rally pointing to a baby wearing a Q onesie.

On the campaign trail during the past two years, at least six Republican congressional candidates, as well as several state and local politicians, have signaled some level of interest in QAnon. Danielle Stella, a Republican congressional candidate in Minnesota whose campaign's Twitter account has "favorited" QAnon material and used a QAnon-related hashtag, was suspended from the platform in November after suggesting that the Democratic incumbent, Ilhan Omar, be hanged for treason.

In an email responding to questions about her position on QAnon, Stella said through a campaign aide: "The decision to side with Twitter regarding my suspension for advocating for the enforcement of federal code proves that The New York Times and Twitter will always side with and fight to protect terrorists, traitors, pedophiles, and rapists."

In San Juan Capistrano, California, Pam Patter­son, a City Council member, invoked QAnon in her farewell speech to the body in Decem­ber 2018, reciting a Q posting as if it were Scrip­ture. "To quote Q No. 2436," she said, "for far too long, we have been silent and allowed our bands of strength that we once formed to defend freedom and liberty to deteriorate. We became divided. We became weak. We elected traitors to govern us."

And in Montana, an elected justice of the peace, Michael Swingley, was reprimanded in November by a state judicial board for using his official email account to send an angry message to a journalist who had written an article skeptical of QAnon. Swingley wrote that, regardless of "whether Q is real," patriots were uniting because of it and "your world of fake news and liberal agendas that give away our country to foreigners and protect the Clintons and Obamas is coming to an end."

Beyond the mainstreaming of QAnon in certain Republican circles, a bigger concern for researchers who track conspiracy theories is the potential for violence by unstable individuals who fall under its sway, particularly in the fraught political climate of the 2020 election. In its intelligence bulletin identifying QAnon as a potential domestic terror threat, the FBI warned that partisan conspiracy mongering in the United States was being exacerbated by "the uncovering of real conspiracies or cover-ups" by political leaders. Social media was serving as an incubator for groundless theories and inspiring followers to take action, it said.

"Although conspiracy-driven crime and violence is not a new phenomenon," the bulletin said, "today's information environment has changed the way conspiracy theories develop, spread, and evolve."

Uscinski said that because some people with a conspiracy mindset are willing to entertain political violence, it was perhaps inevitable that as QAnon attracted a bigger following, it would eventually come to include a dangerous, if tiny, subset of adherents. "Once you reach a threshold of people," he said, "that particular apple is going to show up in the barrel."

If anyone needs to hear this, John F. Kennedy Jr. is dead.

Believers in the far-right circle of QAnon have long held the conspiracy that the son of the former president didn't die in a 1999 plane crash. And now, they've put a fresh spin on it, suggesting on their message boards at QMap that President Trump is set to announce the definitely deceased JFK Jr. as his 2020 running mate, NBC News Ben Collins reports.

A solid bunch of Trump supporters have long believed in "Q," someone with a high level of government clearance who allegedly shares coded messages hinting at Trump's purported efforts to uproot Democrats, Hollywood elites, and the so-called deep state as a whole. They've been seen sporting Q shirts at Trump events, and were out in full force at Trump's campaign launch last week. But Q hasn't been heard from in a month, prompting believers to post extended prayers for their safe return.

Some QAnon believers think there's a reason for Q's absence: They're saving a big announcement for the Fourth of July. As Collins put it in a tweet, "The more delusional Q fans" think Kennedy Jr. himself will reveal July 4 that he's alive and that he's replacing Vice President Mike Pence on the 2020 ticket.

Trump has said he's committed to keeping Pence on the 2020 ticket, but Q would probably find some way to spin the words that came out of the president's mouth.