An article trending on social media claims that the Biden inauguration has been cancelled and that Trump will remain in office after invoking martial law. The article also claims most mainstream media outlets inside the US will lose their licences.
Only days before Biden’s inauguration, many social media accounts known for promoting QAnon themed conspiracy theories have been circulating various conspiracies claiming that Trump will somehow stay in power for a further four years.
One of those claims comes from an article on the BeforeItsNews.com website with the headline “Inauguration Cancelled, Trump Remains in Office, ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, CNN, MSNBC to Loose Licenses” [sic].
That article, among other things, claims that Trump has invoked the Insurrection Act and will remain in office. The article reads in part –
Joe Biden’s Inauguration has been cancelled, President Trump would remain in office and the Chinese Communist Party propaganda media outlets of ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, CNN and MSNBC would soon be off the airwaves according to President Trump.
“I have invoked the Insurrection Act of 1807 (Section 10 U.S. Code 13 251-255) to address the treasonous rebellion conducted by Democrat and Republican lawmakers, CCP Agents (Chinese Communist Party), FBI, Department of Justice, CIA and others to dismantle the United States of America and it’s Constitution,” President Trump declared on Thursday 14 Jan. “These entities pose a direct threat to national security. I will remain President indefinitely until all domestic enemies are arrested.”
The article, which dates back to January 14th, is entirely false. It is essentially a collection of QAnon conspiracies summarised into one single article. However the article makes no effort to backup any of its claims or provide any sources. It simply appears to assume the reader will take the ridiculous and often illogical claims at face value.
Firstly, the headline in the article contains a glaring spelling error, misspelling lose as loose. It is unlikely that any serious reporting will contain such an error within its headline.
Secondly, the site BeforeItsNews.com is a conspiracy site that accepts third party articles from any contributor. It has previously posted spurious stories claiming George Soros had been arrested and a claim about Paul McCartney secretly passing away and being replaced by a body double. The site’s About Us page reads –
Before It’s News® is a community of individuals who report on what’s going on around them, from all around the world.
Anyone can join.
Anyone can contribute.
Thirdly, and most importantly, the claim that Trump has invoked the Insurrection Act is false, and the article contains a number of clearly fabricated and illogical claims. Trump nor anyone within the military has announced that the Insurrection Act has been invoked, and the claim in the article that Trump would remain president “until all domestic enemies have been arrested” is demonstrably false. The Insurrection Act does not allow a president to remain in office after their term expires. As per the US Constitution, Trump’s term expires on January 20th 2021, regardless of whether he invoked the Insurrection Act or not.
The article also claims that Trump is going to take all US mainstream media off air, which again is something that the president is not empowered to do, and again the article does not source any of its wild claims.
The article goes on to make a number of other bizarre and asinine claims, including claims about satanic bloodlines running through the UK monarchy, MI6 and the Vatican. It’s just another regurgitation of previous conspiracies that have been circulating social media since Biden won the 2020 election.