Unfounded fears about sex trafficking did not begin with QAnon and go far beyond it.

The last two years have witnessed an explosion of headlines and concern over the apparent growth of ‘QAnon’, a far-right conspiracy group that believes President Trump is battling against ‘deep state’ child sex traffickers. Using national survey data, Joseph E. Uscinski and Adam M. Enders find that, far from having widespread support, most Americans view the QAnon movement unfavorably, and that they also wildly overestimate the true extent of child sex trafficking.