Kash Patel's QAnon Dalliances Reflect an Outlook That Pits Trump Against Evil Conspirators
The president-elect's pick for FBI director says he rejects some of the right-wing sect's bizarre beliefs but agrees with "a lot of what the movement says."
If the Senate confirms Kash Patel as President-elect Donald Trump's FBI director, perhaps he will get to the bottom of an international conspiracy involving "a secret cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophiles who are abducting, abusing, and ritualistically murdering children by the thousands." Or so QAnon followers, whose bizarre beliefs are guided by the oracular posts of one or more individuals dubbed "Q," might hope, given Patel's overtures to them.
Patel, for his part, says he "disagree[s] with a lot of what that movement says." He nevertheless sees it as an important component of the MAGA constituency, has appeared on many pro-QAnon shows, and has promoted the sect in social media posts.
Patel's attitude is perhaps not surprising, since QAnon depicts Trump as a savior battling the forces of evil that comprise the "deep state," which allegedly includes prominent Democrats, Hollywood honchos, the news media, and other left-leaning organizations. Shorn of its most outlandish elements, that is essentially the story Patel tells in his 2023 book Government Gangsters, which describes a "Deep State" conspiracy against Trump that Patel equates with a scheme to subvert democracy and the Constitution.
"The Q thing is a movement," Patel told podcast host Mary Grace in November 2022. "A lot of people attach themselves to it. I disagree with a lot of what that movement says, but I agree with a lot of what that movement says."
Patel took a similar position during a June 2020 interview with BardsFM. "I agree with some of what he does, and I disagree with some of what he does," he said, referring to the pseudonymous source of QAnon theories. "If it allows people to gather and focus on the truth and the facts, I'm all for it."
When a Patriot Party News host asserted, during a June 2022 show, that "Q has been so right about so many things," Patel concurred. "I agree with you," he said. "He has. And you've got to harness that following that Q has garnered and just sort of tweak it a little bit. That's all I'm saying. He should get credit for all of the things he has accomplished, because it's hard to establish a movement."
The minor tweaks that Patel had in mind presumably would include ditching claims such as the fictitious video that supposedly showed Hillary Clinton and her aide Huma Abedin "ripping off a child's face and wearing it as a mask before drinking the child's blood in a Satanic ritual sacrifice." Patel might also want to excise the belief that Trump, by sipping from a water bottle during a speech in his first year as president, was displaying "a secret sign that he [was] about to bring down an elite child sex-trafficking ring." Come to think of it, that whole idea of an "elite child sex-trafficking ring" run by progressive Satanists, which is central to QAnon teachings, might have to go.
Such quibbles did not stop Patel from effusively praising his hosts during a September 2022 appearance on The MG Show, a QAnon podcast. "You guys are the best," Patel said. "I love being on your program." What makes them "the best," it seems clear, is that they have the right enemies, who are for the most part the same nemeses that Patel identifies in Government Gangsters.
That book includes a 60-name list of current and former government officials, ranging from President Joe Biden to disaffected Trump appointees such as former Attorney General Bill Barr, whom Patel identifies as part of the "Deep State," meaning they have committed unspecified "crimes" as "conspirators" bent on opposing Trump's agenda, which Patel conflates with the fate of the republic. Patel notes that the list is limited to people who have served in the executive branch, so it does not include "other corrupt actors of the highest order," such as Rep. Adam Schiff (D–Calif.), Rep. Eric Swalwell (D–Calif.), and "the entire fake news mafia press corps."
Notwithstanding the overlap between QAnon and the MAGA movement, a reasonably prudent Trump supporter might be leery of allying himself with people who espouse flagrantly loony ideas about how the world works. In 2018, NBC News (part of the "Deep State," as Patel defines it) reported that moderators of a pro-Trump Reddit message board had "banned Qanon posts and automatically delete any new posts about the theory," which "they now view as an embarrassment to their community."
The story cited other signs of right-wing discomfort with QAnon. "Rick Wiles, host of the Christian survivalist radio show 'Trunews,' recently called Qanon 'a big lie,'" NBC News noted. "Evangelical preacher Lance Wallanau, who recently called Rush Limbaugh a 'secular prophet,' said people need to be 'a special kind of dumb' to believe the theory." Cartoonist Scott Adams, "an outspoken Trump supporter," warned that QAnon was making MAGA advocates look like "a bunch of idiots." Even Infowars founder Alex Jones, who "once promoted the theory," had told listeners they should "stick a fork in the avatar of Qanon," which he said "is now an overrun disinformation fount."
Although Patel likewise says he does not buy everything QAnon is selling (just "a lot" of it), he has been much less reluctant to welcome its adherents into the fold. In June 2022, Patel, who serves on the board of the Trump Media & Technology Group, which owns Truth Social, said the platform aimed to "incorporate" QAnon "into our overall messaging scheme to capture audiences."
That goal is consistent with Patel's appearances on podcasts like The MG Show and with his Truth Social shout-outs to QAnon. "Having a beer with @Q right now…" Patel said in a February 2022 post, referring to the author of that Truth Social account. That July, he posted a self-valorizing "Fight With Kash" image that included a flaming Q symbol.
A recent CNN report highlighted Patel's dalliances with QAnon, including his chumminess with The MG Show. This week, MG Show hosts Jeffrey Pedersen and Shannon Townsend decried "the failed attempt by CNN to paint Kash Patel as a QAnon figure." But last week, they welcomed "the exciting news of Kash Patel's excellent nomination to the FBI," noting that Q had singled him out as "a name to remember" in a 2018 post.
Since Patel has repeatedly expressed reservations about QAnon beliefs, it would not be accurate to describe him as "a QAnon figure." Still, it would be fair to say he has expressed admiration for that movement, and QAnon devotees have reciprocated the sentiment. The basis for this affinity is a shared allegiance to Trump and a similar Manichean outlook that divides the world between noble Trump supporters and malevolent critics whose opposition to him counts as prima facie evidence of their involvement in a criminal conspiracy that supposedly cries out for investigation and prosecution.
A Patel spokesperson called the CNN report "a pathetic attempt at guilt by association." But the association in this case is one that Patel deliberately and repeatedly chose, which does not reflect well on the judgment of the man that Trump thinks should run the federal government's chief law enforcement agency. And the reason for that association is even more troubling for anyone who expects a man in that position to be guided by basic principles of justice and respect for the rule of law.
