Topline
Joe Rogan has drawn the ire of former President Donald Trump after the controversial host of the nation’s most-listened-to podcast offered his support for independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a move that comes as pollsters suggest Kennedy could pull votes away from Trump at the ballot box.
Joe Rogan looks on during the UFC 273 event on April 09, 2022.
Key Facts
On Thursday’s episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” the podcaster said Kennedy is the only candidate who “makes sense to me” and said he felt Kennedy was the only candidate who was not trying to “gaslight” or “manipulate” voters.
On Friday, Rogan said his comments weren’t “an endorsement” but that he likes RFK Jr. as a person “and I really appreciate the way he discusses things with civility and intelligence.”
On Friday, Trump lashed out on Truth Social, the social media site he owns, asking “It will be interesting to see how loudly Joe Rogan gets BOOED the next time he enters the UFC Ring??? MAGA2024” (Rogan has worked as a commentator for UFC and Trump has ties to the organization as a close friend of President Dana White, who introduced him at this year’s Republican National Convention).
Rogan’s podcast had 14.5 million followers on Spotify as of March and is broadly associated with conservative viewpoints, but the host’s personal political beliefs have sometimes been hard to pin down—he endorsed Bernie Sanders in the 2020 primaries and then said he would “rather vote for Trump than Biden” after Sanders lost the Democratic nomination.
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Key Background
Rogan’s backing of Kennedy comes as some pollsters predict the independent candidate is more likely to pull votes from the Trump camp than Vice President Kamala Harris on Election Day. Kennedy first ran as a Democratic primary challenger to President Joe Biden before announcing he would run as an independent, raising fears within both parties that Kennedy could disrupt the race—though it was unclear whether Kennedy would take more votes from Trump or the Democratic nominee. Since Harris took over the Democratic ticket, there’s been talk that while Kennedy will likely pull voters from both major tickets, it could be Trump who is hurt by his campaign more. In a Washington Post analysis, several national polls show Harris’ lead on Trump widens if voters are allowed to select Kennedy as an option. FiveThirtyEight’s latest polling average shows Kennedy at about 5%, enough to swing the 2.1% gap between Harris (45.5%) and Trump (43.4%).
Tangent
Rogan started “The Joe Rogan Experience” in 2009 and, as of March, it had almost three times as many followers as the second-most podcast “Ted Talks Daily.” Spotify bought the exclusive rights to host “The Joe Rogan Experience” for an estimated $200 million, and The Washington Post that month estimated the show averages 11 million listeners. Earlier this year, the Wall Street Journal reported he signed another Spotify deal worth up to $250 million. The podcast has frequently been criticized for giving a platform to far-right figures or conspiracy theorists, and has also been slammed for spreading false information about Covid-19, particularly anti-vaccine rhetoric. Kennedy has a longstanding history of vaccine skepticism and has also supported Covid-19 conspiracy theories, including that Ashkenazi Jewish people are less susceptible to the illness and that the Covid-19 virus was genetically engineered.
Surprising Fact
Trump and Kennedy have had some contact. Kennedy privately discussed endorsing Trump at one point last month, but Trump allies ultimately didn’t agree to promise him a job in the administration, The Washington Post reported. And last month, Kennedy accidentally posted a video of a phone call in which Kennedy and the former president discussed vaccines and other topics.
Further Reading
Mary Roeloffs is a Forbes reporter who covers breaking news with a frequent focus on the entertainment industry, streaming, sports news, publishing, pop culture and climate change. She joined Forbes in 2023 and lives in Dallas. She’s covered Netflix’s hottest documentaries, a surge of assaults reported on social media, the most popular books of the year and how climate change stands to impact the way we eat. Roeloffs was included on Editor & Publisher Magazine’s “ 25 Under 30” list in 2023 and worked covering local news in the greater Boston area from 2017 to 2023. She graduated with a double major in political science and journalism from Northeastern University. Follow Roeloffs for continued coverage of streaming wars, pop culture news and trending topics.
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