Sowing the seeds of fear, distrust, and division has always been a tactic of the Left, and it continues to serve them well today in their quest to vilify those who oppose their anti-freedom agenda.
Democrats and the mainstream media are using Qanon-related theories about a March 4 return to the presidency by Donald Trump as justification to claim that the political Right is planning insurrectionist violence on that day — a common narrative used to silence conservatives since the January 6 Capitol protest.
The backdrop is that some purveyors of Qanon — who disseminate the theory that President Trump is working with the military to ultimately bring down the satanic globalist cabal through martial law and tribunals, as revealed to the public via cryptic messages authored by a supposed Trump advisor known only as “Q” — believe March 4 will see Trump sworn in as president again.
This is based on the fact that the original inauguration day was March 4, before being changed to January 20 by the 20th Amendment in 1933.
Some Qanon believers say that when Franklin Roosevelt ended the Gold Standard in that year, he gave power over the country to sinister foreign investors. Moreover, according to the theory, the United States became a corporation in 1871, and every president and amendment since then has been illegitimate.
“Q” himself has been silent since December, but those in the movement claim that by returning on March 4, President Trump will be inaugurated as the 19th president (with former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as his VP), becoming the first legitimate president since Ulysses S. Grant.
While the basis of the theory is debatable, there has been no substantial evidence that believers actually want to take any sort of violent action to bring these events about. Rather, it is akin to adherents waiting to witness the fulfillment of a prophecy.
But that hasn’t stopped Democrats from using this Internet speculation to feed new fears about “violence” from the allegedly radical right.
During a hearing last month, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith (D-Wash.) suggested that 4,000 National Guardsmen are extending their stay in D.C. due to the conversations taking place in the Qanon communities.
“Some of these people have figured out that apparently 75 years ago the president used to be inaugurated on March 4. OK, now why that’s relevant, God knows. At any rate, now they are thinking maybe we should gather again and storm the Capitol on March 4…. That is circulating online,” Smith said.
Moreover, U.S. Capitol Police put out a statement on Wednesday announcing additional security measures, ostensibly in response to intelligence showing “a possible plot to breach the Capitol by an identified militia group on Thursday, March 4.”
“Our Department is working with our local, state, and federal partners to stop any threats to the Capitol. We are taking the intelligence seriously,” the statement added. “Due to the sensitive nature of this information, we cannot provide additional details at this time.”
Yet even establishment observers have admitted that there’s little indication a violent uprising is in the works. “We haven’t seen anything to suggest that there’s any physical, real world mobilization behind that chatter,” Jared Holt, a visiting research fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab, told The Hill.
And Brian Friedberg, a senior researcher at Harvard’s Shorenstein Center, told the outlet that some followers of Qanon have become “skeptical as to origins or validity of [the] theory.”
“Some believe any public gatherings on the 4th to be a trap set for MAGA folk by the MSM/Deep State to draw them out,” Friedberg added in an e-mail.
Perhaps that suspicion of any demonstrations on the March 4 is warranted. At least, Democrats and the mainstream media would be enthralled to have another incident they can point to as “proof” of the Right’s “violent” tendencies.
January 6 provided them with the ammunition to crack down on conservative speech by painting it as “insurrectionist” and “treasonous in nature,” despite evidence that left-wing agitators were among those who stormed the Capitol.
For example, as TNA’s C. Mitchell Shaw noted:
For instance, one poster child for the “insurrection” is Jake Angeli — the “shamanic practitioner” who appeared at the D.C. march in his usual attire of face and body paint and fur headdress complete with horns. Angeli has direct ties to leftist groups and events. He marched in Arizona in September 2019 “in solidarity with climate strikes around the world,” according to photos and reports from azcentral, The National Pulse, and other websites. He also participated in other “climate-change protests” linked to Swedish activist Greta Thunberg. Not a likely entry on the resume of a “Trump supporter.”
Like the Nazis in Germany, America’s Left has discovered that it’s easier to suppress and censor opposing viewpoints than to debate them.