An alarming wave of Republican candidates who flirted with or openly embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory launched bids for Congress this year. But QAnon largely lost at the polls, with 26 of the 28 QAnon-backing Republicans (including three write-in candidates) facing defeat in the general election, many of them losing by 40% or 50% margins.

Even with QAnon flaming out, one of the conspiracy cults most recognizable faces and loudest voices will be striding the halls of Congress next year: Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia. And Lauren Boebert, who didnt get nearly as much pre-election publicity, pulled out an early-morning win in Colorado.

The QAnon movement pushes an unhinged conspiracy theory that Democratic powerbrokers, media bigwigs and Hollywood elites are engaged in child trafficking and drink a chemical harvested from the blood of children they imprison in satanic torture dungeons. That so many QAnon candidates made it this far is a worrying sign of what might yet come. Thanks to social media, the movement continues to spread, and not just in America but around the world.

Most of these candidates won primaries in congressional races that were not competitive for Republicans , and thus they did not face a powerful, party-backed candidate. Accordingly, they got blown out in the general election. Lauren Witzke, a Republican, was pummeled in her race for Senate in Delaware against Democratic incumbent Chris Coons. Witzke not only endorsed QAnon and publicly welcomed its followers into the GOP but also helped a crew of far-right political subversives try to embroil Joe Biden s son, Hunter Biden, in the conspiracy by smearing him with child abuse accusations.