Former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg admitted this week that the Democratic Party won’t find a liberal version of podcast host Joe Rogan, and that efforts to regain cultural relevancy must include connecting with ordinary voters.
The former Biden official made the point on Friday’s “The Weekly Show with John Stewart Podcast.” Buttigieg discussed with the host how Democrats could better get their message out to voters following the 2024 presidential election loss.
“My party’s all up in arms about who’s our Joe Rogan. We’re not going to have a Joe Rogan of the left. That’s not how it works,” he said.
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Stewart agreed with the statement, offering his view that the party can’t just produce at will a top global podcast that will amplify liberal thought.
“It’s also not something you can conjure in the way that – they just think, ‘Oh, let’s inorganically build this thing.’ Those positions have been built over time, and they’ve earned their credibility, and they’ve earned their authenticity, and they’ve earned all those things that they have. You can’t just poof them into existence,” the Comedy Central host stated.
Buttigieg offered this assessment of his fellow Democrats: “The other big thing that my party is terribly behind on is where we say it. And by this I mean what media spaces we are in.”
“The Joe Rogan Experience” is one of the world’s most influential podcasts and has a massive audience of male viewers – a demographic that was considered crucial to President Donald Trump’s 2024 election victory.
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Bloomberg reported in January, “Over the past two years, a set of massively popular podcasters and streamers cemented themselves as the new mainstream source of information for millions of young men, and, according to a new Bloomberg analysis, used their perch to rally these constituents in support of Trump and the political right.”
Trump’s own interview with the podcast giant in the final weeks of his campaign drew tens of millions of viewers. The conversation and Rogan’s ultimate endorsement of Trump’s candidacy were seen as a boon for Trump.
Even the Democratic Party knew the importance of Rogan’s platform, looking to get former Vice President Kamala Harris on his show before Election Day. Those plans fell through, though the former Democratic presidential candidate appeared on other prominent podcasts like “Call Her Daddy” before the end of the race.
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Despite some of the party’s desire to replicate Trump’s success with Rogan, Buttigieg told Stewart it needs to focus on its own original strategy of finding new voters, including going into more conservative spaces.
“I think we are really struggling to find people where they are,” Buttigieg said.
“I could be the tenth person to say roughly the same thing on a liberal show, or I could literally be the first time somebody heard a certain idea if I’m in a more conservative space,” he added, noting the party should be reaching out to people who are “not always looking for politics.”
“People who have other s— to do!” Stewart said. “Yeah,” Buttigieg replied.
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