ExtremismRacist, Extremist, Anti-Semitic Conspiracies Surround Coronavirus Vaccine Rollout

Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, extremists across the ideological spectrum have used the virus as a platform for elaborate and alarming conspiracy theories. In March and April 2020, anti-Semitic, anti-government and Sinophobic conspiracies about the virus’s origins and “true purpose” were rampant online. In December 2020, as the COVID-19 vaccine was being shipped to frontline workers across the country, very familiar conspiracy theories took root in online spaces alongside mainstream concerns about vaccine distribution and effectiveness.

Purveyors of these theories suggest that the vaccine is a new form of population control or elevate debunked fears about the vaccine’s side effects. Some are peddling anti-Semitic tropes about Jewish control of the virus and vaccine, while arguing that Black Americans should be used to test the vaccine’s safety.

The following are a sampling of these conspiracy theories circulating online:

The “Jew Vaccine” 
Anti-Semitism has been an ongoing theme since the pandemic began, with conspiracies alleging that Jews are behind the coronavirus and are using it as a tool to expand global influence and derive profit. As countries begin administering the vaccine, Jews are once again the target of anti-Semitic conspiracies, mostly aimed at dissuading people from being vaccinated.

Much of the anti-Semitic messaging around the vaccine highlights Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla’s Jewish heritage. This fact provides anti-Semites with “evidence” that the widespread vaccine effort is part of a calculated, long-term Jewish plot to institute a “Global Jew Government,” a new iteration of the age-old canard of international Jewish control.

Some believe Jews will achieve this power by using the vaccine ingredients to sterilize the “white race.” Still others assert that the “ZOG” (Zionist Occupied Government) plans to “enslave of all humanity” by preventing the unvaccinated from working, travelling or going to school.  

These anti-Semitic theories of the “Jew Vaccine” proliferate across white supremacist and neo-Nazi websites like Stormfront and The Daily Stormer, as well as in anti-Semitic and coronavirus conspiracy social media channels. One conspiracy, posted to the white supremacist website Stormfront, alleges: “The Jews vaccine changes DNA so that the DNA itself will produce any proteins that the Jews program it to produce via 5G. This gives the Jews the ability to kill you by using 5G to tell the DNA to produce poisons.”