MAGA has a cosmology, a mythology: There is a corrupt elite — in the most extreme forms, it’s a corrupt, pedophilic elite — and that elite controls everything. And Donald Trump as a person, and MAGA as a movement, are justified in doing anything necessary to break that elite’s control and return this country to the people. There’s a problem that movements like this face when they take power: What happens when the conspiracy isn’t there? What happens when you declassify the files and there’s no smoking gun? Or what happens if you read the files and you realize there is some reason you can’t release them? What happens when you are the system? When you become the corrupt elite? The Epstein case has forced MAGA into exactly that kind of reckoning. So I invited Will Sommer on my show to talk about it. He’s been tracking conspiracy theories for years, at The Washington Post and now at The Bulwark, and wrote the 2023 book “Trust the Plan: The Rise of QAnon and the Conspiracy That Unhinged America.” Sommer and I talk about the politics of both QAnon and the Epstein conspiracy theories — how they hit at the populist core of the MAGA worldview and create inevitable problems when their champions gain power. Listen, watch or read here: Here’s what we’re focusing on today:
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