Trust the Plan: The Rise of QAnon and the Conspiracy That Unhinged America

by Will Sommer

In Germany, QAnon was embraced by adherents of the Reichsbürger, or “Reich’s Citizen,” a movement akin to American antigovernment sovereign citizens. Just like sovereign citizens in the United States, Reichsbürger members refuse to recognize laws they disagree with, avoid paying taxes, stockpile weapons, and engage in occasional violent clashes with the police. And, like American sovereign citizens, many of them have gotten deeply into QAnon. Reichsbürger members claim that the German government set up after World War II is a fiction, and that Germany is still under occupation by Allied forces. The real German government, they believe, is the German Reich that existed until 1945. They describe themselves as “citizens of the Reich” and give their allegiance to various crackpots who lead supposed Reich “governments in exile.” For Reichsbürger adherents, QAnon offers a vision for a final utopian moment that would end the Allied occupation.