The account was active at least between September 2019 and January 2021, and had the username @PhDofbombsaway. It used several different screen names, including “Dr. Erwin J. Antoni III” and “Dr. Curtis LeMay,” an apparent reference to the US Air Force general who oversaw a campaign of firebombing Japan in World War II, promoted the use of nuclear weapons, and ran for the vice presidency alongside segregationist George Wallace in 1968. The account’s profile picture was a stock image of a fiery mushroom cloud.
The account’s persona was that of a deeply loyal Trump supporter engaging in conspiracy theories ranging from Covid denialism to attacks on Black Lives Matter, and even ones related to the death of Jeffrey Epstein. The posting, which was infused with a deeply hard-line Catholic worldview, at times displayed misogyny and a knowledge of Nazi military techniques.
The account posted a mixture of conspiracy theories and pro-Trump MAGA content, sharing a veritable who’s who of right-wing influencer accounts, including Jack Posobiec, Mark Dice, James O’Keefe, Scott Adams, Cassandra MacDonald, Steven Crowder, James Woods and Robby Starbuck.
Throughout 2020, the account shared Covid conspiracy theories, especially focusing on the claims that China had purposely manufactured the virus to destroy its enemies.
In February 2020, responding to a posting asking how many nuclear bombs America should drop on China if it turns out the country was responsible for Covid-19, the account—which was using the “Dr. Curtis LeMay” screen name, according to captures from the Internet Archive—wrote “All the bombs—trust me, I’m kind of the expert on this.”
The account posted a wide variety of conspiratorial content, as well as misogynistic content. In November 2019, for example, the person controlling the account claimed that Jeffrey Epstein “didn’t kill himself.” That same month, in response to a post about then presidential candidate Kamala Harris, they wrote, “She does her best work when life brings her to her knees.”
But the account was most consistently vocal in its embrace of the conspiracy theory that Joe Biden stole the 2020 presidential election.
In the days after the November 3, 2020, election, the account posted hundreds of times as it fully embraced numerous conspiracy theories about how the vote had been rigged.
While citing dozens of different GOP lawmakers, Trump himself, and far-right influencers like Phillip Buchanan, the right-wing internet troll known as Catturd, the account most frequently shared claims of election conspiracies from an account called Election Wizard.
That account was run by Travis Vernier, a former Oklahoma City police officer who had no experience in assessing election data. Despite this, Election Wizard became one of the most influential voices in the Stop the Steal movement, to the point that Vernier was even invited to Mar-a-Lago for Trump’s 2022 announcement that he was running for president again.
As well as sharing conspiracy theories, the account bearing Antoni’s name repeatedly used violent rhetoric to declare how far it was willing to go to ensure Trump secured a second term in office.
.jpg)