"Pizzagate" is a conspiracy theory that went viral during the

2016 United States presidential election The 2016 United States presidential election was the 58th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 2016. The Republican ticket of businessman Donald Trump and Indiana governor Mike Pence defeated the Democratic ticket ...

cycle. It has been extensively discredited by a wide range of organizations, including the Washington, D.C. police. In March 2016, the personal email account of

John Podesta John David Podesta Jr. (born January 8, 1949) is an American Political consulting, political consultant who has served as Senior Advisor to the President of the United States, Senior Advisor to President Joe Biden for clean energy innovation an ...

Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...

's campaign chair, was hacked in a

spear-phishing Phishing is a type of social engineering where an attacker sends a fraudulent (e.g., spoofed, fake, or otherwise deceptive) message designed to trick a person into revealing sensitive information to the attacker or to deploy malicious softwar ...

attack.

WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is an international non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder and director and ...

published his emails in November 2016. Proponents of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory falsely claimed the emails contained coded messages that connected several high-ranking

Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to: *Democratic Party (United States) Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to: Active parties Africa *Botswana Democratic Party *Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea *Gabonese Democratic Party *Demo ...

officials and U.S. restaurants with an alleged human trafficking and child sex ring. One of the establishments allegedly involved was the

Comet Ping Pong Comet Ping Pong (often abbreviated as Comet) is a pizzeria, restaurant, and concert venue located on Connecticut Avenue in Washington, D.C.'s Chevy Chase neighborhood. Owned by James Alefantis, Comet has received critical acclaim from ''The ...

pizzeria in Washington, D.C. Members of the alt-right,

conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...

journalists, and others who had urged Clinton's prosecution over her use of an unrelated private email server spread the conspiracy theory on

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

outlets such as

4chan 4chan is an anonymous English-language imageboard website. Launched by Christopher "moot" Poole in October 2003, the site hosts boards dedicated to a wide variety of topics, from anime and manga to video games, cooking, weapons, television, ...

8chan 8kun, previously called 8chan, Infinitechan or Infinitychan (stylized as ∞chan), is an imageboard website composed of user-created message boards. An owner moderates each board, with minimal interaction from site administration. The site ha ...

Reddit Reddit (; stylized in all lowercase as reddit) is an American social news aggregation, content rating, and discussion website. Registered users (commonly referred to as "Redditors") submit content to the site such as links, text posts, imag ...

and

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

. In response, a man from

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and ...

traveled to Comet Ping Pong to investigate the conspiracy and fired a rifle inside the restaurant to break the lock on a door to a storage room during his search. The restaurant owner and staff also received death threats from conspiracy theorists. Pizzagate is generally considered a predecessor to the

QAnon QAnon ( , ) is an American political conspiracy theory and political movement. It originated in the American far-right political sphere in 2017. QAnon centers on fabricated claims made by an anonymous individual or individuals known as "Q". ...

conspiracy theory. It also generated another offshoot conspiracy theory, called Frazzledrip, which involved Hillary Clinton participating in the

ritual murder Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more humans as part of a ritual, which is usually intended to please or appease deity, gods, a human ruler, an authoritative/priestly figure or spirits of veneration of the dead, dead ancestors or as ...

of a child. Pizzagate resurged in 2020, mainly due to QAnon. While initially it was spread by only the far-right, it has since been spread by

teens Adolescence () is a transitional stage of physical and psychological Human development (biology), development that generally occurs during the period from puberty to adulthood (typically corresponding to the age of majority). Adolescence is ...

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"who don't otherwise fit a right-wing conspiracy theorist mold": the biggest Pizzagate spreaders on TikTok appear to otherwise be mostly interested in topics of viral dance moves and

Black Lives Matter Black Lives Matter (abbreviated BLM) is a decentralized political and social movement that seeks to highlight racism, discrimination, and racial inequality experienced by black people. Its primary concerns are incidents of police br ...

. The conspiracy theory has developed and become less partisan and political in nature, with less emphasis on Clinton and more on the alleged worldwide elite of child sex-traffickers.

Origins

Genesis

On October 30, 2016, a

account posting

white supremacist White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White s ...

material which said it was run by a Jewish New York lawyer falsely claimed that the

New York City Police Department The New York City Police Department (NYPD), officially the City of New York Police Department, established on May 23, 1845, is the primary municipal law enforcement agency within the City of New York, the largest and one of the oldest in ...

(NYPD) had discovered a

pedophilia Pedophilia ( alternatively spelt paedophilia) is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Although girls typically begin the process of puberty ...

ring linked to members of the

while searching through Anthony Weiner's emails. Throughout October and November 2016,

had published John Podesta's emails. Proponents of the conspiracy theory read the emails and alleged they contained code words for pedophilia and human trafficking. Proponents also claimed that

, a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., was a meeting ground for

Satanic ritual abuse The Satanic panic is a moral panic consisting of over 12,000 unsubstantiated cases of Satanic ritual abuse (SRA, sometimes known as ritual abuse, ritualistic abuse, organized abuse, or sadistic ritual abuse) starting in the United States in th ...

. Deriving its name from the

Watergate scandal The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon from 1972 to 1974 that led to Nixon's resignation. The scandal stemmed from the Nixon administration's contin ...

, the story was later posted on

fake news websites Fake news websites (also referred to as hoax news websites) are websites on the Internet that deliberately publish fake news— hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation purporting to be real news—often using social media to drive web traffic and ...

, starting with '' Your News Wire'', which cited a

post from earlier that year. The ''Your News Wire'' article was subsequently spread by pro-Trump websites, including SubjectPolitics.com, which added the claim that the NYPD had raided

's property. The ''Conservative Daily Post'' ran a headline claiming the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...

had confirmed the conspiracy theory.

Spread on social media

According to the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

Much of the purported evidence cited by the conspiracy theory's proponents had been taken from entirely different sources and made to appear as if it supported the conspiracy. Images of children of family and friends of the pizzeria's staff were taken from

sites such as Instagram and claimed to be photos of victims. On December 10, 2016, ''The New York Times'' published an article that analyzed the theory's claims. They emphasized that: * Theorists linked the conspiracy to Comet Ping Pong through similarities between company logos and symbols related to Satanism and pedophilia. However, ''The Times'' noted similarities were also found in the logos of a number of unrelated companies, such as AOL, Time Warner, and MSN. * Theorists claimed an underground network beneath Comet Ping Pong; the restaurant has no basement, however, and the picture used to support this claim was taken in another facility. * Theorists claimed to have a picture of restaurant owner Alefantis wearing a T-shirt endorsing pedophilia. However, the image was of another person, and the shirt, which read "J'❤ L'Enfant," (French for "I ❤ The Child") was actually a reference to the L'Enfant Cafe-Bar in D.C., whose owner was pictured in the image, and which itself is named after Pierre Charles L'Enfant, the designer of much of the layout of Washington, D.C. * Theorists claimed John and Tony Podesta kidnapped Disappearance of Madeleine McCann, Madeleine McCann using police sketches that were, in fact, two sketches of the same suspect taken from the descriptions of two eyewitnesses. No alleged victims have come forward and no physical evidence has been found.

Responses

In an interview with NPR on November 27, 2016, Comet Ping Pong owner James Alefantis referred to the conspiracy theory as "an insanely complicated, made-up, fictional lie-based story" and a "coordinated political attack". Syndicated columnist Daniel Ruth wrote that the conspiracy theorists' assertions were "dangerous and damaging false allegations" and that they were "repeatedly debunked, disproved and dismissed". Despite the conspiracy theory being debunked, it continued to spread on social media, with over one million messages using hashtag #Pizzagate on Twitter in November 2016. Stefanie MacWilliams, who wrote an article promoting the conspiracy on ''Planet Free Will'', was subsequently reported by the ''Toronto Star'' as saying, "I really have no regrets and it's honestly really grown our audience". Pizzagate, she said, is "two worlds clashing. People don't trust the mainstream media anymore, but it's true that people shouldn't take the alternative media as truth, either". On December 8, 2016, Hillary Clinton responded to the conspiracy theory, speaking about the dangers of fake news websites. She said, "The epidemic of malicious fake news and fake propaganda that flooded social media over the past year, it's now clear that so-called fake news can have real-world consequences".

Public opinion

A poll conducted by Public Policy Polling on December 6–7, 2016, asked 1,224 U.S. registered voters if they thought Hillary Clinton was "connected to a child sex ring being run out of a pizzeria in Washington DC". Nine percent of respondents said they believed she was connected, 72% said they did not, and 19% were not sure. A poll of voters conducted on December 17–20 by ''The Economist''/YouGov asked voters if they believed that "Leaked e-mails from the Clinton campaign talked about pedophilia and human trafficking - 'Pizzagate'." The results showed that 17% of Clinton voters responded "true" while 82% responded "not true"; and 46% of Trump voters responded "true" while 53% responded "not true". Academic Roger Lancaster likened the impact of Pizzagate to the Satanic panic of the 1980s : at the time, Day-care sex-abuse hysteria, hundreds of daycare workers were falsely accused of abusing children.

Alex Jones and ''InfoWars''

After the Comet Ping Pong shooting, Alex Jones of ''

InfoWars ''InfoWars'' is an American far-right conspiracy theory and fake news website owned by Alex Jones. It was founded in 1999, and operates under Free Speech Systems LLC. Talk shows and other content for the site are created primarily in stud ...

'' backed off from the idea that the D.C. pizzeria was the center of the conspiracy. On December 4, ''InfoWars'' uploaded a YouTube video that linked Pizzagate to the November 13 death of a sex-worker-rights activist. The video falsely claimed that she had been investigating a link between the Clinton Foundation and human trafficking in Haiti. It speculated she had been murdered in connection with her investigation. According to the activist's former employer, family and friends, her death was in fact a suicide and she was not investigating the Clinton Foundation. By December 14, ''Infowars'' had removed two of its three Pizzagate-related videos. In February 2017, Alefantis' lawyers sent Jones a letter demanding an apology and retraction. Under Texas law, Jones was given a month to comply or be subject to a libel suit. In March 2017, Alex Jones apologized to Alefantis for promulgating the conspiracy theory, saying: "To my knowledge today, neither Mr. Alefantis, nor his restaurant Comet Ping Pong, were involved in any human trafficking as was part of the theories about Pizzagate that were being written about in many media outlets and which we commented upon."

Michael Flynn and Michael Flynn Jr.

In the days leading up to the 2016 election, Michael Flynn, then a top surrogate for Trump and later Trump's National Security Advisor (United States), National Security Advisor, posted multiple tweets on Twitter containing conspiratorial material regarding Hillary Clinton and her staff. They alleged that John Podesta, drank the blood and bodily fluids of other humans in Satanic rituals, which ''Politico'' says "soon morphed into the '#pizzagate' conspiracy theory involving Comet Ping Pong". On November 2, 2016, Flynn tweeted a link to a story with unfounded accusations and wrote, "U decide – NYPD Blows Whistle on New Hillary Emails: Money Laundering, Sex Crimes w Children, etc ... MUST READ!" The tweet was shared by over 9,000 people, but was deleted from Flynn's account sometime during December 12–13, 2016. After the shooting incident at Comet Ping Pong, Michael Flynn Jr., Michael T. Flynn's son and also a member of Trump's transition team, tweeted: "Until #Pizzagate proven to be false, it'll remain a story. The left seems to forget #PodestaEmails and the many 'coincidences' tied to it." On December 6, 2016, Flynn Jr. was forced out of Presidential transition of Donald Trump, Trump's transition team. Spokesman Jason Miller (communications strategist), Jason Miller did not identify the reason for his dismissal, however, ''The New York Times'' reported that other officials had confirmed it was related to the tweet.

Developments within QAnon

Merger with QAnon

Pizzagate became a pillar of the far-right QAnon conspiracy theory, which emerged in 2017 and incorporated its beliefs. QAnon, which has been likened in the media to "Pizzagate on steroids", and a "big-budget sequel" to Pizzagate, linked the child trafficking ring to a nefarious worldwide conspiracy. It also developed Pizzagate's claims by adding the concepts that the sexual abuses are part of Satanism, Satanic rituals and that the abusers murder the children to "harvest" the adrenochrome from their blood, which they then use as a psychoactive drug, drug or as an Elixir of life, elixir to remain youthful.

Frazzledrip

A related conspiracy theory known as "Frazzledrip" (sometimes spelled "Frazzled.rip") emerged in 2018, claiming that an "extreme snuff film" was recovered from Anthony Weiners stolen laptop and was circulating on the dark web. According to that story, the file named "Frazzled.rip" was hidden in a folder called "life insurance" in Weiner's computer: the video contained in that file was said to show Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin raping and murdering a young girl, drinking her adrenochrome-rich blood in a Satanic ritual, and "tak[ing] turns wearing the little girl's face like a mask". Purported frames from the video circulated to back these claims: according to Snopes, some of these images came from a YouTube video originally posted on April Fools' Day 2018, and a photo which was said to show Huma Abedin wearing a mask had been taken from the website of a Washington D.C. Indian restaurant and portrayed the owner of that establishment. Hundreds of videos on YouTube promoted these false statements, and the claims were still circulating internationally within QAnon groups two years later in 2020.

Global spread

In 2020, as the broader QAnon movement became an international phenomenon, Pizzagate also gained new traction and became less U.S.-centric in nature, with videos and posts on the topic in Italy, Brazil, Turkey and other countries worldwide each gaining millions of views. This new iteration is less Partisan (politics), partisan; the majority of the (mostly teenage) promoters of the #PizzaGate hashtag on

were not right-wing, and support the

movement. It focuses on an alleged global elite of child sex-traffickers, ranging from politicians to powerful businesspeople and celebrities such as Bill Gates, Tom Hanks, Ellen DeGeneres, Oprah Winfrey and Chrissy Teigen. Justin Bieber's 2020 song Yummy (Justin Bieber song), "Yummy" was alleged to be about the conspiracy theory, and rekindled support for the theory during the year. The conspiracy theory gained traction when Venezuelan YouTuber, Dross Rotzank, made a video about Bieber's music video and its alleged references to Pizzagate. Rotzank's video gained 3 million views in two days and led "Pizzagate" to become a Twitter#Trending topics, trending topic on the Spanish-language

. Adherents of the theory also believe that Bieber gave a coded signal admitting as such in a later Instagram Live video, where he touched his hat after being asked to do so in the chat if he was a victim of Pizzagate (however, there is no indication that Bieber saw this comment). In April 2020, a documentary promoting Pizzagate, ''Out of Shadows'', was made by a former Hollywood stuntman and released on YouTube. TikTok users began promoting both ''Out of Shadows'' and the alleged Bieber association until the #PizzaGate hashtag was banned by the company. ''The New York Times'' said in June 2020 that posts on the platform with the #PizzaGate hashtag were "viewed more than 82 million times in recent months", and Google searches for the term also increased in that time. They also reported that "In the first week of June, comments, likes and shares of PizzaGate also spiked to more than 800,000 on Facebook and nearly 600,000 on Instagram, according to data from CrowdTangle ... That compares with 512,000 interactions on Facebook and 93,000 on Instagram during the first week of December 2016. From the start of 2017 through January of 2020, the average number of weekly PizzaGate mentions, likes and shares on Facebook and Instagram was under 20,000". In August 2020, Facebook temporarily suspended use of the "#savethechildren" hashtag, when used to promote elements of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory and QAnon. The improper use of the hashtag caused protests from the unrelated NGO Save the Children. ''The Pizzagate Massacre'' (originally titled ''Duncan''), a dark satire film inspired by the Pizzagate conspiracy theory and Edgar Maddison Welch's shooting of Comet Ping Pong, was released on VOD in November 2021.

References

External links

* {{Authority control 2016 controversies in the United States 2016 hoaxes /pol/ phenomena Alt-right Conspiracy theories promoted by Donald Trump Controversies of the 2016 United States presidential election Disinformation operations Fake news False allegations of sex crimes Hoaxes in the United States Internet manipulation and propaganda Mass media-related controversies in the United States Propaganda in the United States Pseudohistory Satanic ritual abuse hysteria in the United States Terrorism in the United States QAnon