FEC Has Questions For Suspected Author Of QAnon Posts

Zach Everson

Staff Writer

MARCH 29, 2022

The campaign for Ron Watkins, a Republican running for Congress in Arizona who’s suspected to have authored message-board posts that fueled the false QAnon conspiracy, originally failed to disclose 40% of the contributions it received in the final three months of 2021, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission.

In a campaign-finance report submitted in January 2022, Ron Watkins for Congress told the FEC it had received $30,600 in contributions over the last three months of 2021. Last week, the campaign amended its filing to disclose that it actually received $51,000 over that period.

On Monday, the FEC asked the campaign to explain why the contributions were omitted from the original report. A response is due by May 2.

“A discrepancy that large is very unusual,” said Brett Kappel, an attorney specializing in campaign finance at Harmon, Curran, Spielberg & Eisenberg. “It would always result in a letter from the FEC requesting an explanation for the under-reporting of such a large percentage of incoming contributions. That said, the FEC is more lenient toward first-time candidates.”

Spokespeople for the campaign did not respond to inquiries.

The campaign received a donation of $2,400 described as “t-shirts” from Jim Watkins, Ron’s father who owns and operates the 8chan and 8kun message boards from where the Qanon conspiracy spread. Other supporters of Watkins’ campaign listed their occupations as physician, accountant, self-employed geologist and mechanic for D.C. Metro. Apart from Jim Watkins, none of the campaign’s other donors are notable in the QAnon community, according to Travis View, the pseudonymous co-host of the “QAnon Anonymous” podcast, which reports on the conspiracy.

Only three of the 39 donors the campaign identified are from Arizona.

Watkins appeared to admit he was behind the vast Qanon conspiracy in HBO’s 2021 docuseries Q:Into The Storm. Forensic linguists also found evidence Watkins was posting as Q, the New York Times reported last month. Watkins has denied the claim.

Supporters of then-President Donald Trump flew a U.S. flag with a symbol from the group QAnon outside the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images) Getty Images

Welcome to the latest issue of Checks & Imbalances

Today we look at Florida Republicans' feud with Disney, more campaign contributions from Ginni Thomas and the latest in Donald Trump's legal issues.

Checks & Imbalances usually publishes on Mondays and Thursdays. Please support this work, if you can, by subscribing to Forbes. Any tips or suggestions? Email me at zeverson@forbes.com.  And you can follow me on Twitter at @z_everson. Thanks!

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Continuing Irresolutions

Updates on Checks & Imbalances’ previous reporting

Last week, Checks & Imbalances reported that Ginni Thomas, the spouse of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, has contributed at least $15,000 to Republican political committees, according to federal and state records.

Turns out that figure is at least $20,000.

Revising the search parameters on the FEC's website to include an abbreviation of the city in which Thomas lives and the work address listed on her website turned up 13 more contributions, totaling $4,600. The largest recipient of this batch was Ted Cruz’s 2016 presidential campaign, which received $1,600 from Thomas.

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Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.) announced he would resign from Congress on March 31, after a jury convicted him on Thursday of lying to the FBI about an illegal campaign donation from a foreign national. Fortenberry’s campaign reported spending $158,000 on legal fees last year. Fortenberry also launched a legal expense trust in August.

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“Over the last five years, 50 billionaires and 17 spouses of billionaires have donated to Manchin’s campaign committee or leadership PAC,” none of whom reside in West Virginia, Michela Tindera reported in November.

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The No Labels Problem Solvers PAC had a problem with its February campaign filing, according to the FEC. The nonpartisan, centrist PAC failed to forward contributions earmarked for other committees within 10 days, as required by law.

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