The Left Needs Media That Competes — and Wins
The Right’s growing success with working-class voters wasn’t won with policy papers or think tanks; it was built through media that speaks their language. If the Left wants to compete, it needs to build a media ecosystem that resonates.
Tucker Carlson speaks at his Live Tour at the Desert Diamond Arena on October 31, 2024, in Phoenix, Arizona. (Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images)
In the 1994 midterms, Republicans swept Congress, taking both the House and the Senate, as well as the majority of state legislatures and governorships. Conservatives and liberals alike credited talk radio for “turning the tide” and Republicans honored Rush Limbaugh — then the king of the format — by declaring him an honorary member of the 104th congressional class. A decade later, in 2004, George W. Bush defeated John Kerry and won the popular vote with the help of Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News, which had come to dominate cable television. That year, veteran conservative activist Richard Viguerie called Fox “one of the [conservative] movement’s greatest success stories.”
In the 2024 election, Donald Trump wielded yet another mass communication medium that conservatives have managed to conquer: podcasting and online video. Trump’s brash “alt-media strategy” overwhelmed Kamala Harris and the Democrats’ ground game, propelling the twice-impeached, convicted felon back into the White House. Many on the Left have long romanticized on-the-ground politicking, but no amount of door-knocking can match the reach of conservative influencers who build parasocial bonds with one’s neighbors and provide them, each day, with powerful stories that make sense of political life.
Murdoch and Trump have always held a media-centric theory of power, and, for the most part, their theory has proven to be correct. With the decline of unions and so many other forms of civic life, media organizations have filled the void and have even usurped some of the traditional duties political parties once played.
Before the dust settled on the morning of November 6, a debate had already begun over whether progressives need their “own Joe Rogan.” These are not the conditions with which we hoped to see such a debate unfold, nor is a fixation on Joe Rogan helpful in determining the terms for that debate. But it’s time to face the reality of conservative media strength and the need to build a left media counterpower.
We are scholars who have spent years studying right-wing media and interviewing those who consume and produce it. We have little sympathy for its ideological content, yet we can’t help but envy how the Right has spent decades building an alternative media sphere — one with many strengths the Left lacks. While the Left has a vibrant sphere of publications, Substacks, and niche podcasts, these overwhelmingly cater to an already highly engaged, college-educated audience. The Right, meanwhile, has dedicated much more effort to reaching working-class communities and audiences beyond conservative elites.
The push to invest in progressive media is not new. Even before this election cycle, there were concerted calls for liberal donors to redirect some of the billions spent on political advertising toward longer-term investments in media. We may now be at a tipping point. Given the broader need for the Democratic Party — and progressive institutions generally — to rethink strategy in response to class dealignment, media should be central in this discussion.
Yet there’s a potential pitfall. Enthusiasm for countering conservative media dominance could lead to an overinvestment in online video platforms that merely amplify the existing progressive voices — essentially, a more digital, niche MSNBC. Such projects may appeal to progressive activists and donors because they reflect familiar aesthetic and moral sensibilities, but they would do little to expand the Left’s reach.
While a range of left-of-center media and organizing efforts is necessary, one thing is certain: it would be a tragic missed opportunity if the Left fails to build a media ecosystem that genuinely speaks to working-class tastes and experiences.
Media Persuasion as Building Cultural Bonds
To build a media ecosystem that rivals right-wing media in both reach and impact, progressives need moving and compelling stories of public life that reach new audiences. Left politics must be presented in ways that make working-class experiences central, using storytelling that is dynamic, accessible, and engaging. This media can’t be boring or overly wonky — it must speak in popular vernaculars with style and panache. More than just informing, it should create pathways for weak partisans and nonideologues pathways to feel connected to a broader left community. This is a media-movement strategy that is fundamentally oriented toward democratic persuasion.
There’s understandable disillusionment about persuasion today. People rarely change their minds — especially on big political questions — just because they are presented with “the better argument.” At the heart of media building, however, is a persuasion different in kind from the narrow notion of debaters’ talking points. As the Right’s best propagandists intuitively understand, much of the real persuasion happens before the policy debates even occur.
It is a game of creating long-term cultural and emotional bonds between media and audiences. This can happen through a political talk radio program, a Fox News morning show, or even ostensibly nonpolitical spaces. After all, some of those who appear to have been Trump’s most potent messengers this past election came from outside traditional news media — video game streamers, YouTube pranksters, anti-woke comedians, and mixed martial arts (MMA) fighters. When the moment for arguing Trump’s case arrived, vast portions of the online public were already pulling for the Right to win the exchange of ideas. The goal wasn’t just to win debates; it was to position Trump as the champion of pink- and blue-collar workers, farmers, multiracial small business owners, Christians, young men, and any other group the Right could claim to represent.
Learning From the Right
The dominance of movement-conscious conservative media is not an accident — it is the result of decades of effort. Liberal and left millennials came of age politically in a world that Fox News created, making the prevalence of conservative media in their lives feels almost inevitable, as if it sprung organically from the reactionary bedrock of the country. But this perspective overlooks the deeper history of right-wing media — a history that is marked by more failures than successes in appealing to workers.
In the early 1990s, a wave of conservative TV ventures — now largely forgotten — attempted to establish a foothold. Newt Gingrich’s National Empowerment Television (NET) and other Fox prototypes assumed they would prosper simply by branding themselves as Republican and dishing out the good gospel of Reagan conservatism. Yet in hindsight, these efforts were hopelessly unentertaining — think right-wing PBS.
Why then did Fox succeed when past conservative media had failed? The standard explanation — that it simply catered to an underserved market of conservative ideologues — is wrong. The most successful right-wing media outlets —Limbaugh, Fox, Breitbart — did more than push ideology. They blended tabloid aesthetics, populist narratives, and “authentic” personalities to cultivate a loyal audience. More than just a news source, they presented themselves as champions of their viewers’ dignity, the only voices that truly respected their communities.
This was not a claim rooted in objective reality, but it was compelling because it largely went unchallenged. Beginning in the 1970s, mainstream media moved away from working-class audiences. Labor beats ended, newspapers curtailed delivery to less wealthy and less dense communities, and major news outlets shifted their focus to promotional efforts and lifestyle reporting designed for affluent readers. This trend was turbocharged by digital markets forcing news to rely on paying subscribers rather than advertisers. These pressures have intensified what scholar Victor Pickard describes as the tendency toward “informational redlining” endemic to market-based media systems.
Meanwhile, the Right invested in formats that appealed to working-class audiences: talk radio, tabloid-style cable news, and, later, online video. Once drawn in, viewers could be gradually pushed rightward. Recent research has shown that viewers are often initially attracted to conservative media not by ideology, but by style and tone — voice, aesthetics, relatability. Over time, they come to embrace its political narratives and ideological positions.
This isn’t a matter of “style over substance,” if by that we mean superficial flair overriding audiences’ critical faculties. Rather, style opens a path for substance. A conservative pundit or podcaster may first attract viewers or listeners with humor, a conversational tone, or an air of authenticity that contrasts with the scripted polish of corporate media. What develops is a bond. Once viewers or listeners identify with the voice behind the mic — once they believe he or she has goodwill toward people like them — they become more receptive to the influencer’s help in making sense of the confounding world of politics.
At the peak moment of the coconut tree memes, many liberals started to think of media power as a matter of blasting the internet with good vibes. Yes, vibes are important. But what makes the conservative media ecosystem influential in a sticky, durable way is not just virality or contagious affect. What really matters is when partisan media are able to influence common sense, speaking to inchoate frustrations and desires and offering overarching “deep stories” that frame the ongoing conflicts at the heart of political life.
Consider a conservative podcaster who draws in listeners with an approachable style. Emotionally gripping stories depict the people as under siege by them — elites who condescend and see the audience as trash. A curated set of claims and information (whether true or false) reinforces conservative positions as obvious, logical conclusions. Political loyalties and preferences take shape through these relationships.
As our in-depth interviews with conservative news consumers show, relationships with trusted media sources help guide how people make sense of the world. For instance, adopting nativist attitudes toward border restrictions doesn’t necessarily stem from animosity toward immigrants. Rather, it comes from reliance on conservative media voices to piece together the “truth” of the situation — border towns in chaos, cartels running ruthless trafficking operations, Democrats doing the bidding of corporations looking for cheap labor. Soon enough, some come to believe that “open border” policies are even inflicting suffering on aspiring immigrants themselves — duped by human traffickers and exploited by employers.
Building a Popular Media Front
So where are the left news voices telling different stories that are pitched to a variety of working- class communities? Voices that such communities can identify with and who speak in their familiar vernaculars? If you are college-educated and immersed in a progressive subculture, there are plenty of options. But where are the left media voices trying to make sense of politics for the Applebee’s manager in Trenton, the home health aide in Middle Tennessee, the sanitation worker in Staten Island, or the security guard in California’s Great Valley?
Left commentators have long chastised free-market conservatives for peddling a fictitious vision of America as a “classless” society (a criticism that is entirely warranted). Yet progressives often overlook class-based elements in our media analysis, as evidenced by the great underinvestment in media with different class-based market appeals. Progressives’ egalitarian rhetoric will ring hollow when the prevailing voice and aesthetic of its news channels cater overwhelmingly to college-educated professionals, the upper-middle class, and older voters.
Building a network of diverse and popular media voices in a left coalition will be key to enhancing the political capacity of progressives. It must challenge conservative media by competing directly for working-class audiences, telling stories about the world that speak to the tastes and experiences of working-class communities, both white and nonwhite, urban and rural.
This may sound like a Herculean task, but there are already promising efforts are already underway. A wide range of progressive influencers, radio hosts, and podcasters have made their mark with little support from established media or party figures. Consider progressive YouTube programs like Kyle Kulinski’s Secular Talk and Francesca Fiorentini’s The Bitchuation Room, to “bro” Twitch streamers like Hasan Piker, Twitter personality and self-described Appalachian bartender John Russell, or pro-union, trans-partisan, antiestablishment shows like Breaking Points.
Expanding and connecting this emerging media network will require collaboration and cooperation. Grassroots organizers can help discover and elevate talent — launching YouTube channels, building TikTok creator networks, and linking up with new outlets. Donors and investors can provide a key role too, providing the resources needed for both small- and large-scale media projects. Undoubtedly, both philanthropic and commercial markets present real disadvantages for left movement media. But that’s the terrain on which we must work for now, even if ultimately a much stronger public media is necessary for an informed democracy.
Additionally, political parties shouldn’t be afraid to engage with the diverse voices in their ranks. Democratic officials and candidates, in particular, need to put themselves out there and accept invites to do interviews with emerging progressive outlets — even when it may conflict with their own politics or pose some risks. Political parties play a critical role in promoting upstart media ventures. Republican leaders nourish and embrace even the most marginal sectors of the conservative media environment, whereas even the progressive wing of the Democratic Party has been hesitant to embrace independent left media.
To some extent, Democrats’ caution is understandable. Right-wing media figures pride themselves on proclaiming they are not lapdogs of the Republican Party. But despite this performance of autonomy, they reliably fall in line behind GOP nominees. Rush Limbaugh, for instance, was famously wooed into supporting George H. W. Bush over Pat Buchanan in 1992. Tucker Carlson has privately admitted that he “passionately” hates Donald Trump, but that’s not the tone he had taken on air. Democrats fear that independent left media, unlike its right-wing counterpart, won’t offer the same deference — and try to skewer them in ways conservative media never does to Republicans.
Breaking Out of the Silo
An independent left media will not create the same controlled environment many Democrats and their patrons have come to rely on: paid advertisements, social media posts, and highly selective engagements with professional news. Hopefully, the 2024 election compels Democrats to move beyond these safe spaces. A vibrant left media sphere — with different strains of Democrats and leftists engaging in meaningful debate — would likely cool some of the animosity that festers when some views and communities are kept isolated. It might also counter factionalism and splintering across the left-of-center coalition.
The reluctance to engage new voices extends far beyond elected Democrats. Many progressives instinctively resist calls for outreach beyond the base. Some radicals cling to the fantasy that simply exposing more people to radical views will inspire a groundswell of support. Some wealthy backers may fear the unpredictable demands that new voices might introduce. Some activists fear that calls for “outreach” are just a coded push for moderation and tacking to the center. Given how often moderation is framed as the only path to grow a coalition, this skepticism is warranted. But building a left media sphere isn’t about compromising — it’s about forging new pathways to the Left.
Casting left values as the natural end point of rational thought and human empathy might be flattering to our self-image, but we know that’s not the way it works. We all exercise moral agency of course, but not in conditions of our making. We all need help. We all depend on social networks and media sources to help make sense of the world around us. Right now, most Americans won’t encounter the stories and arguments that might inspire commitment to left projects. We need to fight to change that. This kind of democratic persuasion will take concerted, relentless, and creative effort. The only thing we have to lose is our silos.