Behind the Bastards

Part Two: Romana Didulo: Queen of Canada

February 5, 2026

Key Takeaways Copied to clipboard!

  • The initial grift of Romana Didulo, the subject of this episode of *Behind the Bastards*, may have been tied to a $2 million cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme involving a recruiter known as Whiplash 347. 
  • Didulo's escalating claims, including adopting titles like 'Sovereign Head of State' and issuing executive orders like withdrawing Canada from the UN, mirror common sovereign citizen rhetoric and Trump-era policy announcements. 
  • The cult leader's descent into greater delusion is paralleled with the experience of billionaires, as constant affirmation from followers erodes their grip on reality, leading to increasingly extreme pronouncements like death sentences for those enforcing COVID measures. 
  • Romana Didulo's followers were primarily motivated by a desire to feel special and participate in a world-saving fantasy, contrasting with Didulo's own motivation rooted in escaping a difficult, unrespected life by becoming queen. 
  • Didulo's attempt to co-opt the Ottawa trucker protest failed quickly when her extreme claims, such as believing Canada is a corporation and burning the Canadian flag, alienated the majority of other right-wing protesters. 
  • Didulo exhibits a pattern of delusional grandiosity, claiming connections to world leaders like Vladimir Putin and Mohammed bin Salman, while simultaneously displaying practical financial awareness when avoiding liability for rented RVs. 

Segments

Cult Leader Sanity and Grift Evolution
Copied to clipboard!
(00:04:01)
  • Key Takeaway: Cult leaders often start with an initial, achievable financial grift but become increasingly unmoored from reality as followers validate their delusions.
  • Summary: The structure of a con involves an initial plan, which either succeeds or fails, leading to a secondary phase where the leader and followers drift further from reality. Extreme wealth or total belief in a supernatural identity accelerates this detachment, as the leader stops receiving necessary real-world pushback. Successful cult leaders, like L. Ron Hubbard, maintain sanity by keeping a foot in reality, such as maintaining a part-time job outside the cult structure.
Initial Crypto Ponzi Scheme Link
Copied to clipboard!
(00:09:12)
  • Key Takeaway: Romana Didulo’s initial scheme likely involved recruiting followers for a crypto Ponzi scheme that netted $2 million, suggesting a financial motive for her early claims.
  • Summary: An investigation linked Didulo to Whiplash 347, a leader in a fraudulent cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme. The speaker speculates that Didulo’s role was to leverage her growing following to help scam money from them. This early association suggests the Queen of Canada narrative began as a vehicle for financial exploitation.
Sovereign Citizen and Debt Cancellation Policies
Copied to clipboard!
(00:10:37)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo integrated sovereign citizen concepts, declaring Canada an illegitimate corporation and promising debt cancellation, tapping into ancient desires for a debt jubilee.
  • Summary: Didulo adopted the title ‘Sovereign Head of State’ and used language adjacent to American sovereign citizen beliefs, particularly regarding debt cancellation. Her 2021 policies included withdrawing Canada from the UN and WHO, mirroring Trump-era isolationism. She promised followers entry into a ‘quantum financial system’ where all debt would be wiped clean, a concept with ancient historical roots.
Anagram Proof and Cult Logic
Copied to clipboard!
(00:17:49)
  • Key Takeaway: A key piece of evidence for followers is that Romana Didulo’s name is an anagram for ‘I am R. Donald,’ illustrating the whimsical logic used to confirm legitimacy.
  • Summary: Followers often work backward from their belief to find ‘clues’ confirming Didulo’s status, with the anagram being a primary example. This highlights how the desire for an exciting alternative reality often overrides rational comprehension. The hosts note that this belief system allows followers to avoid confronting depressing or complicated real-world news.
Testing Real-World Activism and Threats
Copied to clipboard!
(00:19:22)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo began testing her control by ordering followers to distribute real-world cease and desist notices against COVID mandates, escalating threats to death.
  • Summary: In June 2021, Didulo ordered followers to hand out documents demanding an end to all COVID measures, using sovereign citizen language. She explicitly stated that the penalty for violating these orders was death, which was met with jubilation by her followers. The hosts note that real-world activism, like distributing flyers, signals a dangerous shift from online rhetoric to potential action.
Financial Ruin from Debt Forgiveness
Copied to clipboard!
(00:36:10)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo’s decree forgiving all debts led followers to stop paying mortgages and utilities, resulting in evictions, loss of heat, and endangerment of their families.
  • Summary: In January 2022, followers stopped paying bills based on Didulo’s decree, leading to severe consequences like utility shutoffs during extreme Canadian weather. Some followers begged the Queen for new decrees to stop the shutoffs, even after their pets died from heat exposure. This marked a transition from funny online behavior to serious, life-threatening real-world harm.
Claimed Executions and Alien Involvement
Copied to clipboard!
(00:43:04)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo claimed 2.7 million people had already been executed by military tribunals under the command of a ‘galactic federation of worlds of light beings.’
  • Summary: Didulo claimed these executions were part of ‘Nuremberg II trials’ occurring since 2017, even claiming to have personally executed Queen Elizabeth. This escalation incorporated alien entities into her narrative to explain how these mass killings were being carried out. She also claimed the sitting US President, Joe Biden, was an imposter.
Trucker Convoy and Public Appearance
Copied to clipboard!
(00:49:30)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo seized the opportunity of the 2022 Canadian trucker convoy to make her first public appearance, seeking attention and financial gain from the spectacle.
  • Summary: Seeing the national attention on the convoy, Didulo broke her isolation to travel to Ottawa, accompanied by her initial inner circle, Corey and Daisy. Upon meeting her inner circle, she immediately instructed them not to call her ‘Queen’ because her roommates did not know her secret identity. Corey and Daisy were quickly disillusioned upon seeing the filthy conditions of her living space.
Follower Motivation and Delusion
Copied to clipboard!
(00:55:02)
  • Key Takeaway: Followers sought a fantasy of being special, while Romana Didulo sought deference and respect absent in her previous life.
  • Summary: Followers of Romana Didulo were drawn to the fantasy of participating in a world-saving quest, fulfilling a need to feel special. For Didulo, the role of queen provided immediate respect and deference she lacked while living on the margins. This dynamic fueled a level of willful delusion among her supporters.
Convoy Launch and Fan Reaction
Copied to clipboard!
(00:56:05)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo’s convoy to Ottawa began with about 15 people, marked by extreme emotional reactions from fans, which was addictive for Didulo.
  • Summary: Corey and Daisy transported Didulo to meet about 50 fans near Victoria’s Parliament, where one person cried upon seeing her. The group, consisting of about 15 people in five vehicles including rented RVs, then began a fast trek toward Ottawa. This intense adoration provided an addictive contrast to Didulo’s former life in a ‘shitty little hoarder house.’
Conflict with Ottawa Protesters
Copied to clipboard!
(00:57:24)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo’s group clashed with other right-wing protesters in Ottawa because most did not believe her specific claims about fighting the Chinese military underground.
  • Summary: Upon reaching Ottawa, Didulo’s small following (a couple dozen people including locals) quickly encountered conflict with the larger right-wing protest movement. Most other protesters, while potentially sharing other grievances, did not believe Didulo’s specific narrative about being the Queen who defeated the Chinese military. This conflict intensified after Didulo burned a Canadian flag to symbolize destroying the ‘corrupt corporate Canadian government.’
Reaction to Flag Burning
Copied to clipboard!
(00:59:17)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo reacted to losing followers after the flag burning by refusing to apologize and instead attacking the truckers for their disobedience.
  • Summary: Several followers left the movement after the flag burning incident, realizing the situation was more extreme than anticipated. Didulo refused to apologize or explain her actions, viewing the dissent as disobedience to her rule as queen. She had hoped the occupation would elevate her to major national figure status.
Failed Media Engagement
Copied to clipboard!
(01:00:11)
  • Key Takeaway: Fox News reporters ignored Didulo’s attempts to insert herself into interviews, leading her to threaten to report the reporter to their commander-in-chief (Carl in Arizona).
  • Summary: Didulo attempted to leverage a Fox News interview opportunity by live-streaming and trying to barge into an interview with truckers, claiming Fox had requested her presence. When the reporter ignored her claims of being the Queen of Canada, she angrily threatened to inform the commander-in-chief. She was actually referring to ‘Carl in Arizona,’ not Joe Biden.
Jealousy and QAnon Claims
Copied to clipboard!
(01:01:26)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo expressed deep jealousy toward other grifters during the trucker rally failure and claimed that ancient royal families and alien alliances, not truckers, were saving the world.
  • Summary: Didulo’s posts from this period revealed intense jealousy over other figures gaining more success and attention while she felt ignored. She dismissed the truckers’ efforts, asserting that ancient royal families and Galactic/Intergalactic Alliances had been working for millennia to free Earth. This failure did not significantly increase her follower count but provided her with better living conditions in RVs.
RV Rental Issues and Finances
Copied to clipboard!
(01:03:18)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo demonstrated financial rationality by returning rented RVs to avoid massive liability costs, but then strained finances by booking $300/night hotel rooms for followers in case Vladimir Putin visited.
  • Summary: The group had to return rented RVs immediately after the rental company discovered they were being taken to Ottawa, as the vehicles were expensive and uninsured. This forced the cult into hotels for a week, straining their finances, which were estimated to be in the low tens of thousands. Despite this, Didulo insisted on keeping a $300-a-night room open constantly for a potential visit from Vladimir Putin.
Putin Watch and Reality Warping
Copied to clipboard!
(01:06:58)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo claimed Vladimir Putin gifted her an autographed watch, illustrating how she haphazardly alters reality to support her delusions of grandeur.
  • Summary: The story of the ‘autographed watch’ from Putin serves as a case study in how Didulo warps reality to support her delusions. A man named Marcus, possibly a minor QAnon figure, gave her a watch that looked like a Rolex, which she then claimed was a gift from the Russian President. She also claimed Putin was working with the White Hats to prevent the invasion of Ukraine.
Extreme Claims of Power and Status
Copied to clipboard!
(01:10:04)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo claimed she was given Air Force One (which she planned to rename QR1), was invited to Pyongyang by Kim Jong-un, and received money from MBS.
  • Summary: Didulo claimed she received Air Force One from the US President, intending to rename it QR1 and have it repainted with her insignia for a trip to Russia. She also asserted that Kim Jong-un placed her flag on all North Korean government buildings and invited her for a state visit. Furthermore, she claimed Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) was her personal friend and sent her large sums of money.
Alien Origin Revelation
Copied to clipboard!
(01:12:21)
  • Key Takeaway: Didulo revealed her true origin was not as a Filipino immigrant, but as an alien from the planet Arcturus, whom she compared to Yoda.
  • Summary: As the road trip continued, Didulo became more open about her origins, stating she was an alien from the planet Arcturus, sent by God to save people. She claimed the Arcturians are the most advanced beings, explicitly comparing them to ’the Yoda’ from Star Wars. She maintained she was not a dictator but was guided by the highest divine beings.