Podcasts: The New Frontier in Political Campaigns

The Political Scene brings you a recent episode of Vanity Fair’s “Inside the Hive,” hosted by the special correspondent Brian Stelter. The Atlantic staff writer Helen Lewis and the Bloomberg reporter Ashley Carman join Stelter to discuss the Trump campaign's strategy of courting so-called podcast bros,  including the comedian Theo Von and the Twitch streamer Adin Ross. Both have provided Trump with some of the most viral moments of the 2024 campaign, and helped him reach a young, male audience whose support he may need in order to win in November. The strategy carries risks, however, as we’ve seen in the case of Trump’s running mate, J. D. Vance, whose past media appearances have come back to haunt him. “They do kind of lure people into this . . . confessional, chatty mode,” Lewis says of the bro podcasts. “And I think that's why maybe they could become quite dangerous. . . . Politicians might not realize how that might look in the cold light of day to other people.”

This episode originally aired on September 12th.

To discover more from “Inside the Hive” and other Vanity Fair podcasts, visit vanityfair.com/podcasts.