Roseanne Barr once again shared some praise for Donald Trump on Twitter, rounding out a week that saw Roseanne return to television with huge ratings and President Trump reaching out to the star with a congratulatory phone call. Barr’s past comments and her decision to make Roseanne Conner a Trump supporter on the popular ABC revival have caused a lot of discussion in the media. Some are critical and others are celebratory, but everybody is trying to put together the puzzle behind the success.
All the while, Barr continues to be “very much online” as some on Twitter would say and is posting comments that cause confusion and a little controversy. While she has deleted some of the more inflammatory tweets, her latest has many asking what she’s referencing and if it might indicate something a little darker:
President Trump has freed so many children held in bondage to pimps all over this world. Hundreds each month. He has broken up trafficking rings in high places everywhere. notice that. I disagree on some things, but give him benefit of doubt-4 now.
https://twitter.com/therealroseanne/status/979890451200258048
Nobody will argue that human trafficking is reprehensible and any efforts against it are worthy of praise. But Roseanne’s comments left many asking where she was getting this information. As Dianna E. Anderson explains on Twitter, the comment likely stems from a claim made last year that human trafficking arrests are up since Trump entered The White House:
Roseanne’s tweet about Trump “saving kids” has to do with a fake claim from Trump Internet that arrests for human trafficking are up since Trump took office. There are a few things wrong with that. (a short [?] thread).
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
Claim’s been rotating since at least last summer (when I first saw it) and we don’t actually have official numbers for Trump’s administration yet. Most recent numbers are 2016.
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
Second, the specific number Trump folks like to cite is about 6k, compared to ~2k under Obama (these are all numbers from memes about this). The 2k number from Obama is Homeland Security Investigation arrests. The number for Trump is … well. ?????
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
But all that matters is that Trump Has a Bigger Number Than the Black Guy, and they aren’t going to check their sources anyway. Most of the way folks appear to have arrived at that number is by looking at the number of trafficking arrests *worldwide*.
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
They also have culled the number by combining a bunch of different reports of ICE arrests (which are not human trafficking arrests) and arrests re: child sex abuse cases (again, NOT human trafficking).
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
They also have pulled in, as near as I can tell, numbers of arrests for sexual solicitation, which also artificially inflates Trump’s number, while comparing it to Obama’s *actual* HSI trafficking numbers.
— Mx. D. E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) March 31, 2018
Roseanne later tweeted an explanation for the post saying, “I have worked with victims of trafficking for decades & supported the fight against it.”
https://twitter.com/therealroseanne/status/979949369754611713
But her post also carries a darker connection, leading many to point the QAnon conspiracy theory that has spread online in the past year involving President Trump:
“Q” or “QAnon” refers to a user on the anonymous message board 4chan. The user claims to be a high-ranking government official with inside knowledge of the White House where, he claims, Trump is planning mass arrests of top Democrats for allegedly being involved in a satanic child-sex-trafficking ring.
Roseanne’s connection comes from a deleted tweet from November 2017 that said, “Tell Qanon to DM me in the next 24 hours.” Some are making connections with her bizarre Tweet from Friday and the larger conspiracy theory that shares a lot of DNA with the Pizzagate conspiracy theory. The comedienne has mentioned it several times on Twitter, but this latest post doesn’t mention any direct connection.
One thing that is certain is Barr’s support for Trump is clear and isn’t going anywhere on Twitter or her sitcom. If this is the discussion after only one week, it’s going to be quite a long season as we move along.
(Via The Hollywood Reporter / Daily Beast)