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The QAnon Queen’s Road Trip From Hell
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For years Romana Didulo, better known to her followers as Queen Romana, has built a following of tens of thousands of people online behind a blend of QAnon conspiracies, COVID-19 denial, new age mysticism, the support of a supposed intergalactic alien consortium, and perhaps most notably, the belief that she is the one true sovereign Queen and ruler of the ‘Kingdom of Canada.’
But in the past year the QAnon Queen’s movement has gone offline, resulting in real world actions that began with the harassment of healthcare workers and COVID compliant businesses and escalated into an attack on local police forces in Ontario.
Today, The Queen is on a non-stop RV tour of Canada, greeting followers and soliciting thousands of dollars in donations from her ever growing online platform. This has even led some experts to call the burgeoning group a cult. Now, some former members of Romana Didulo’s inner circle, who allege that they were subjected to emotional and financial abuse, are fighting back.
This story was produced by Sam Eagan, It was reported by Mack Lamoureux and Sam Eagan. Editing by Julia Nutter.
VICE News Reports is produced by Sam Eagan, Sophie Kazis, Adreanna Rodriguez and Adriana Tapia. Our senior producers are Jesse Alejandro Cottrell, Janice Llamoca and Julia Nutter. Our supervising producer is Ashley Cleek. Our associate producer is Steph Brown. Sound design and music composition by Steve Bone, Pran Bandi, and Kyle Murdock.
Annie Aviles is our Executive Editor and Janet Lee is Senior Production Manager for VICE Audio. Fact Checking by Nicole Pasulka. Our theme music is by Steve Bone. Our host is Arielle Duhaime-Ross.
Special thanks to Sophie Kazis, Josh Visser, Christina Sterbenz, and Caryma Sa’d.
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