During and after the 2024 presidential election, some on the political right made the mistake of believing that just because President Trump had successfully used a cross-section of podcasts and YouTube platforms to circumvent the mainstream media that the legacy “liberal” media had been rendered irrelevant.
It was not. Not even close.
There have been multiple stories of late screaming that Trump has “lost the podcast bros.” Much of that is also wishful thinking. To be sure, podcast mega-hosts such as Joe Rogan, Theo Von and Andrew Schulz, who all gave Trump a collectively massive platform in 2024, have questioned certain Trump policies or statements now. That said, all would presumably still have him on their platforms today.
Trump still having access to tens of millions via various podcast outlets is not the issue. The real question is, how rewarding will those platforms be for Republicans come 2026 and 2028? Most especially when the next Republican presidential nominee will not be Trump.
With Trump not on the national stage as a candidate, the echo chamber for the Republican Party is going to change. It is likely to shrink, and morph back to a much more traditional message machine. Trump is able to reach tens of millions at once because he is a once-in-a-generation “lighting in a bottle” personality. The next Republican presidential candidate will be a mere mortal seeking to out-shout other mere mortals.
But those “mere mortal” Republicans will also be going back to a distinct disadvantage. I have argued in the past that over the course of the last five decades or so, the left has gained majority control over what I call the “five major megaphones” of our nation: the media, academia, entertainment, science and medicine. Of the five, the media is still by far the most powerful.
Modern national elections often come down to a few hundred thousand votes or less, spread out over just a few key swing districts, counties and states. Flip just one-quarter of 1 percent in one district, one-eighth of 1 percent in one county and one-sixteenth of 1 percent in one state, and you can emerge as the next president of the U.S.
Every single Republican and conservative I know deeply believes that the majority of the mainstream media will be placing a thumb of pure lead upon the political scales come the midterm elections in 2026 and the 2028 presidential election. That predicted interference, combined with the other four major megaphones carrying oceans of water for the Democrats, over the next three years will be a Mount Everest-like hurdle for the Republicans to vault.
The Republican Party has two options. It can create its own “megaphones,” or it can go into political battle with a lineup of mere mortals shouting at the moon while the Democrats unleash their army of allies in the media, academia, entertainment, science and medicine.
One of the most powerful speeches ever delivered was Teddy Roosevelt’s “Citizenship in a Republic,” given in Paris on April 23, 1910. Now better known as “The Man in the Arena,” it said:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood … who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Trump was an iconic billionaire living an iconic billionaire’s life. He needed none of this. He could have remained in that bubble of opulence floating high above most in peace and tranquility. But instead, he chose the arena.
Who from that multi-billionaire class will jump next? Who from the peanut gallery of “cold and timid souls” will take the risks Trump assumed?
Among all the conservative, Republican and faith-based billionaires scattered across our nation, there may be as much as $1 trillion at their disposal. More than enough to create a few megaphones of their own. More than enough to amplify the voices of “mere mortals.”
Come November 2026 and November 2028, the mainstream media, along with the other four megaphones, will be in a much stronger position to influence the public once again. Republicans need to either accept that reality or alter it. The clock is ticking.
Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official.
