That rally solidified a recent trend of Trump embracing QAnon imagery and messages more openly than in the past, with a recent Truth Social post showing himself in a Q pin along with the QAnon slogan, “The storm is coming.” (Where “the storm” is Trump arresting and even executing his political opponents.) In attendance at the rally was Vincent Fusca, the man QAnon adherents believe is John F. Kennedy Jr.
And, at the end of the rally, many in the crowd raised their arms and extended a single finger in what looked all too much like a Nazi salute as a song played that either was the QAnon anthem “Wwg1wga” or was a "virtually identical" or possibly fully identical song called “Mirrors.”
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The people who showed up had come for the usual menu of Trump lies and bragging and hate speech and more lies. Here in late 2022, Republicans can get the hateful policies and more polished versions of the lies from lots of other politicians. Trump is jealous that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis got to get the headlines from grabbing migrants in Texas and dropping them on Martha’s Vineyard. He can claim credit for the Supreme Court that overturned Roe v. Wade, but he’s not the most relevant factor in Republican-controlled states instituting harsh abortion bans. He’s not personally harming trans kids through exclusionary and abusive policies. Trump may have set the tone, but the Republicans currently in office have been ready and willing to continue carrying out the cruelty while he golfs and fumes about being under investigation.
So the audience that’s there for Trump is there because of his cult of personality. That remains frighteningly strong—he was able to drag J.D. Vance and Mehmet Oz over the Republican primary finish lines in Ohio and Pennsylvania despite their weakness as candidates, for instance, and he’s still the strongest fundraiser among Republicans (sometimes to their regret, since he doesn’t share). Trump is far from irrelevant, and not just because so many Republican leaders are competing to be more hateful than him. But the fact that so many of the people willing to show up for him on a Saturday during a major local college football game are now visibly Q-affiliated is a sign of Trump’s shifting status in his party. The thing about cult leaders, though, is they don’t get less scary when they feel their power waning.
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