QAnon faithful gather in Vegas on their mission to save the world from Satan

The Patriot Double Down convention will bring together speakers who believe in a war between Donald Trump and the Devil worshippers

QAnon member Jake Angeli, aka Yellowstone Wolf, centre, in the US Capitol on January 6. Q believers took up Donald Trump’s cry that last year’s US election had been stolen. Picture: AFP

In the cool of a Las Vegas morning a former speechwriter for Donald Trump smoked a cigarette by the entrance to a glass hotel, chatting with a man in a cowboy hat who became famous for riding a horse from New Mexico to the White House.

Meanwhile, a sheriff-turned-media personality was finishing his breakfast inside, and various Republican politicians and candidates were expected.

It was just another stop on the conservative speaking circuit — with one important difference: the Patriot Double Down convention over the weekend had been organised by followers of the conspiracy theory QAnon, who believe that the world is in the grip of an epochal battle pitting Trump against a global cabal of Democrats and Satan-worshipping elites guilty of horrific crimes against children.

The line-up featured speakers who believe that a heroic government insider, or a group of insiders, known as “Q” has exposed a war between Trump and the Devil worshippers through cryptic messages posted in an online chatroom.

QAnon demonstrators protest child trafficking on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles last year. Group members tend to avoid talking openly. Picture: AFP

John Sabal, 31, the conference organiser, felt that some in the movement were strangely embarrassed to talk openly. Not so the Patriot Double Down.

“We are loud and proud,” he said. “The information that we have been given is going to change the world.”

A star speaker was Ron Watkins, the administrator of the internet message board where many of Q’s messages appeared. Watkins, who is widely suspected of being “Q” (he has denied it), is now running for Congress in Arizona.

Another speaker, Alan Fountain, said he planned to talk about “the paedophile, blackmail and bribery system”. A global cabal had been enslaving humanity, he explained, in an interview with the British YouTuber Nicholas Veniamin.

“Their whole goal is to feed off the energy of humans. We are basically their sustenance and this has been covered up and hidden for hundreds of years, so this movement is vital to liberating humanity.”

Fountain called the conference “the largest gathering of patriots that are the great awakening movement and also traditional politicians”.

Chroniclers of QAnon trace its origins to a gnomic remark by Trump in 2017. Standing in the state dining room of the White House, surrounded by senior military officials who had gathered there for dinner, the president addressed reporters.

Chroniclers of QAnon trace its origins to a remark by Donald Trump in 2017. Picture: AFP

“You guys know what this represents?” he said. “Maybe it’s the calm before the storm.”

In The Storm Is Upon Us, the QAnon-watcher Mike Rothschild describes how this was met, a few weeks later, with an anonymous post on 4chan: a messageboard filled with pornography, neo-Nazi agitation and people claiming to be government whistleblowers.

The message said: “Hillary Clinton will be arrested between 7.45 AM-8.30 AM EST on Monday — the morning on [sic] October 30, 2017”. This was followed by posts predicting riots, the deployment of the military and a reference to Trump’s “calm before the storm” comment.

As these posts gained traction, a community of interpreters calling themselves “Anons” sprang up to decode them and offer elaborations, including a variation of the “blood libel” that spurred attacks on Jews during the Middle Ages, alleging that Satan-worshipping elites were murdering children and drinking their blood. Trump, with his wealth and scant political ties, had been brought in by the military to clean house: there would be mass arrests and a purge of the “deep state”.

Trump himself preferred not to contradict the idea that he was saving the world. “Is that such a bad thing?” he said, when asked to disavow it. His ideas were energising an element of the Republican base: last year, two political candidates who had dabbled in Q-adjacent ideas were elected to congress.

Many QAnon supporters have fallen out with their families and are often kicked off Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Picture: AFP

Q believers took up Trump’s cry that last year’s election had been stolen and stormed the US Capitol on January 6 to try and stop the certification of the results.

As Washington was locked down after the insurrection, QAnon followers believed that the huge military presence for Joe Biden’s inauguration signalled the promised military purge. The Democrats would be arrested and Trump would return in glory to the White House.

When it did not happen, there was outrage and disbelief among Anons, many of whom had fallen out with their families. They had also been kicked off Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

Sabal, a prominent voice in the movement, said he and his girlfriend, Amy, decided to organise a conference in Texas to gather together the Anons and revive their spirits.

Travis View, 38, host of the podcast QAnon Anonymous, said he was startled by the scale of the Texas event, following previous low-key meet-ups involving a few dozen people — “but this was $US500 a head, lasted three days and had spectacular production values”. The Las Vegas event was its sequel.

Finishing his cigarette, Couy Griffin, the country-crossing horseman and leader of Cowboys for Trump, said the conference would feature “speakers who have different ideas and different opinions. And that’s the way we should be as Americans.”

The Sunday Times