The tragic death of Tafari Campbell, the Obamas’ personal chef, is QAnon’s latest conspiracy theory

According to a new report by Newsweek, the details surrounding the tragic death of the Obamas’ personal chef, Tafari Campbell, have become fodder for new conspiracy theories from some far-right conservatives and members of QAnon, a political conspiracy theory and movement that centers on fabricated claims made by an anonymous individual or individuals known as “Q.” 

Shortly before 10 a.m. on Monday, police divers recovered Campbell’s body from Edgartown Great Pond near the former president’s home on Martha’s Vineyard. The chef, who started as a sous chef at White House during the Obama administration, had been paddleboarding and drowned, according to authorities. However, a growing number of far-right commentators are challenging that sequence of events, despite having no concrete evidence to support another. 

For instance, Ian Miles Cheong — a prominent Malaysian pro-Trump conservative — commented on Twitter (now rebranding to X) that the death of a “trained swimmer who drowned in a shallow pond outside the Obama family home while paddle boarding, is strange.What do you think really happened?” As Nesweek reported, QAnon advocate Liz Cronkin, who “says that America is secretly being run by a cabal of satanic child molesters” then insinuated that Campbell perhaps knew too much. “What did he know?” she wrote. 

In a statement, the Obamas said that Campbell was “a warm, fun, extraordinarily kind person who made all of our lives a little brighter.”