Please do not rationalize Trump's endorsement of QAnon as a matter of political expediency or necessity, or treat this as just another form of appeasing "the base".

QAnon is bigger than it should be but it's not *that* big. Even if it were, it is fundamentally anti-democratic (and verging on fascistic) to capitalize on blatant lies in order to win popular support.

That QAnon is fundamentally antisemitic, and that it preys on people's natural concern for children in order to manipulate them into acts of vigilante violence are just further reasons why this cannot be treated as acceptable.

Every Republican leader needs to denounce this. Every community leader who has influence with conservatives and evangelicals needs to work to oppose this. It's too late for tech deplatformings to be sufficient. This is a deep and dangerous rot.

"This moment was an inevitability. The only real hope now is for a large group of Republicans with power – and with power among Republicans – to come out against this despite what Trump said today.” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/19/trump-qanon-praise-conspiracy-theory-believers