If Donald Trump's campaign "joke" that he wouldn't mind if journalists got shot didn't make it clear, the president-elect is incredibly hostile toward the free press and has been for years. Still, his latest pitch for his second term is pretty jarring, even for him.
This week, Trump's large adult son Don Jr. mentioned on his podcast Triggered that his dad might be in favor of kicking journalists out of the White House briefing room. Chatting with his co-host, the conservative Daily Wire’s Michael Knowles, Don Jr. said Trump was into the idea of replacing credentialed journalists with bro-y, manosphere podcasters who… are not doing journalism at all.
“I wonder now, as your father is assembling his team, as maybe [incoming White House press secretary] Karoline Leavitt is looking at the new press briefing room chart, maybe it’s time to reorder that chart and maybe take away some people’s seats,” Knowles said.
Don Jr. excitedly responded that he pitched this exact idea to his dad last week “on the plane” flying back from a SpaceX launch with Elon Musk: “We were talking about the podcast world and some of our friends and Rogan and guys like you.” His dad, Don Jr. says, then told him, “'That’s a great idea, Don.'”
Look, it's entirely believable to me that Trump would be down to throw journalists out of the briefing room. But slightly less believable is him spending time with his kids. Alas, I digress!
“So, that may be in the works,” Don Jr. said, triumphantly adding, “That’s going to blow up some heads, so we’ll see.” He also justified this pitch with a predictable rant about the New York Times’ supposed liberal bias: “If the New York Times has lied, they’ve been adverse to everything, they’re functioning as the marketing arm of the Democrat Party, why not open it up to people who have larger viewerships, stronger followings?"
In his first term, Trump issued temporary credentials to far-right conspiracy theorist outlets like Infowars and temporarily blocked mainstream outlets like the New York Times, Politico, CNN, BuzzFeed, and the BBC in favor of right-wing publications like Breitbart News, the One America News Network, and the Washington Times. To be clear, the White House Correspondents' Association, which is independent of the White House, is responsible for assigning seats in the briefing room. Still, Trump will surely find some way to weasel in alternative, manosphere media heads into his briefing room if that's what he wants. Though, I will say... I don't really know what someone like Rogan has to gain from trekking from Austin, Texas, to Washington, D.C., to sit in a cramped room and play-act as a journalist.
The 78-year-old president-elect gained serious ground with young men by bro-ing out with their podcaster idols on the campaign trail, and now it sounds like Trump is inclined to reward them with access to his second presidency over actual journalists. Some of those podcaster idols include the Nelk Boys, Adin Ross, Theo Von, and other professional misogynists whose videos, streams, and podcast episodes cumulatively draw billions of views and listens. Trump and JD Vance’s frequent stops on their shows are credited with turning millions of Gen Z men into Trump supporters, luring teen boys and young men with content about standard male interests—like MMA fighting and video games—and then infecting their brains with all the standard fare bigotry and misogyny.
As Media Matters for America’s Angelo Carusone explained to Jezebel last week, right-wing manosphere voices are “creating a lens for young men to see the world.” If Trump brings them into the White House, particularly at the expense of credible reporters trying to hold the administration accountable, these influencers will only gain more power and a greater reach to push disinformation.
