MAGA’s Fort Knox Theory Makes Goldfinger Look Like a Documentary
From Epstein files to Fort Knox gold - MAGA's conspiracy machine finds a new target
President Donald Trump is once again under pressure from parts of his base - not over the Epstein files this time, but over growing calls to audit the nation’s gold reserves at Fort Knox.
As reported by Sarah Rumpf at Mediaite, frustration over the administration’s failure to release the so-called Epstein files has led many Trump supporters to pivot toward a longstanding conspiracy theory about the United States Bullion Depository, better known as Fort Knox.
“Even if the Trump administration is able to soothe the ruffled feathers of those who expected to gawk at a list of powerful pedophiles,” Rumpf writes, “there’s already another outrage waiting in the wings.”
Fort Knox, officially the United States Bullion Depository, is one of the most secure facilities in the world. It currently holds 147.3 million troy ounces of gold, according to the U.S. Mint - about half the country’s total reported gold reserves. It is not open to the public, and access is so restricted that there have only been three confirmed outside visits since the facility was completed in 1936: President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1943, a group of journalists and members of Congress in 1974, and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Sen. Mitch McConnell in 2017.
In February, Elon Musk stoked speculation when he tweeted, “Maybe it’s there, maybe it’s not,” and suggested, “It would be cool to do a live video walkthrough of Fort Knox!” In response to a suggestion from ZeroHedge, Musk asked, “Surely it's reviewed at least every year?” to which Sen. Rand Paul replied, “Nope. Let’s do it.”
According to Newsweek, Musk’s comments were made in his role as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a newly created task force aimed at auditing federal programs. Social media users and some lawmakers have joined the call for Musk to conduct a full inspection of the vault.
Former Rep. Ron Paul - whom Musk recently endorsed for chair of the Federal Reserve - pushed for a Fort Knox audit for years. “It’d be nice for the American people to know whether or not the gold is there,” he told Fox Business in 2010. Paul has echoed unverified theories that the gold may have been swapped, secretly sold, or replaced with gold-plated tungsten.
Financial author James Rickards told Newsweek an audit would “help restore the confidence of U.S. citizens in government representations,” though he added that the real controversy might not be about how much gold is missing, but how much of it has been leased out or is of irregular purity: “DOGE may open the can of worms.”
BullionVault’s Adrian Ash told Newsweek that what many people are calling an “audit” isn’t really that. “You don’t want an audit per se,” he said. “You want an inspection and a tally count” - a bar-by-bar inventory that would be enormously expensive and time-consuming. “If they were to go through with this properly, it’s not going to be cheap,” he said.
All of this has reignited old theories that something about Fort Knox doesn’t add up. And while those theories may be growing louder online, I’d heard many of them before - and frankly, the plot of Goldfinger seems more real to me than these do.