Ed Mullins, the president of a New York Police Department union, appeared Friday on Fox News during a segment raising eyebrows over a “QAnon” coffee mug clearly visible behind him.
A mug containing several clear references to QAnon, a fringe right-wing conspiracy theory, could be seen near Mr. Mullins as he appeared on the “Your World with Neil Cavuto” show.
Proponents of the QAnon theory, which first emerged in 2016, broadly assert that President Trump is the target of a “deep state” coup with connections to Satanism and pedophilia.
Mr. Mullins, the president of the NYPD’s Sergeants Benevolent Association, later said he has “no idea” about QAnon and that the mug belongs to someone else, Business Insider reported. He also said the office where he was sitting during the TV interview “wasn’t even in New York,” but he refused to say where it was located or if it was associated with the SBA, according to the report.
He did not immediately return a message from The Washington Times inquiring further.
The FBI addressed QAnon in a May 2019 intelligence bulletin later published by Yahoo News. “The FBI assesses these conspiracy theories very likely will emerge, spread and evolve in the modern information marketplace, occasionally driving … individual extremists to carry out criminal or violent acts,” the document said in part.
“I was going to say that this would be like finding out that the head of a major police union is obsessed with the Illuminati, but that would be less crazy than this” author Tom Nichols reacted on Twitter to Mr. Mullins appearing on TV in front of the QAnon coffee mug.
Others were more succinct in slamming the union boss, meanwhile.
Bill Neidhart, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s press secretary, shared an image on Twitter of Mr. Mullins and the mug along with a single-word reaction: “Delusional.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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