Donald Trump will once again be the president of the United States. It wasn’t especially close. Which came as a shock, unless you watch or listen to Theo Von. Or the Nelk Boys. Or Adin Ross. Or Andrew Schulz. Or Shawn Ryan. Or sure, yes, Joe Rogan, but he’s the one you’ve definitely heard of.
You’re going to hear a lot of people attribute Trump’s win to all kinds of reasons: inflation fatigue, immigration fearmongering, Biden’s doomed determination to have one last rodeo. But he owes at least part of his victory to the manosphere, that amorphous assortment of influencers who are mostly young, exclusively male, and increasingly the drivers of whatever monoculture remains in an online society that’s long since been fragmented all to hell.
It’s on these podcasts and streams that Trump spent a disproportionate amount of time in the final weeks of his campaign, and for good reason. That list above—plus Tucker Carlson—includes the four biggest podcasters on Spotify. Trump sat with all of them, often for hours, reaching millions of conservative or apolitical people, cementing his status as one of them, a sigma, a guy with clout, and the apex of a model of masculinity that prioritizes fame as a virtue unto itself. For many young voters who weren’t paying attention in 2016 and 2020, a generation that overwhelmingly gets their news from social media feeds rather than mainstream outlets, this was also their first real exposure to Trump.
Trump used these podcast appearances to both humanize and mythologize himself. He used them to launder his extremist positions through the pervasive can’t you take a joke filter that propels the Tony Hinchliffes of the world to stardom. Most important of all, he used them to get out the vote.
Much of this happened in corners of the internet that lots of people have never heard of, much less visited. When you think of Trump in his element, you may think first of the rallies, the often garbled, hours-long orations in front of camo-laden disciples. They serve their purpose for both sides: Trump got the in-person adoration he craves, and “resistance” Democrats got to laugh at the half-empty arenas and uncanny septuagenarian dance moves.
But in 2024, shouting to a few thousand true believers has nothing on being anointed by Elon Musk on X and a cadre of right-wing influencers with collective followings in the hundreds of millions.
