As more Americans get their news from online shows, they have become an increasingly influential and trusted medium. In a recent study, Media Matters found the most popular online shows to be overwhelmingly right-leaning. 

Analyzing popular online shows that were active in 2024, Media Matters found 320 with a right-leaning or left-leaning ideological bent. Over a third self-identified as nonpolitical, even though 72% of these shows were determined to be right-leaning. Instead, these shows described themselves as comedy, entertainment, sports, or sorted themselves into other supposedly nonpolitical categories.

At least 12 of these supposedly nonpolitical online shows interviewed Trump or Vance during the 2024 presidential election, including The Joe Rogan Experience, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, PBD Podcast, The Shawn Ryan Show, The Lex Fridman Podcast, Full Send, Flagrant, Impaulsive, Bussin’ with the Boys, The Tim Dillon Show, All-In Podcast, and Adin Ross’ online streams.

These 12 online shows — which have at least 270 million combined followers and subscribers across platforms — self-categorize as sports, comedy, technology, business, philosophy, or other nonpolitical genres. 

Media Matters reviewed the 86 episodes streamed or uploaded by the 12 online shows in the first 30 days of Trump’s second term — between January 20 and February 18 — and found that 11 of the shows pushed pro-Trump messaging or right-wing misinformation/narratives at least once during the time frame.

In fact, two-thirds of the episodes — 58 out of 86 — included right-wing messaging from hosts and/or guests. This included 21 episodes featuring right-wing messaging from hosts, 6 from guests, and 31 from both hosts and guests.

These figures expressed excitement over Trump’s second term, assured audiences that tariffs would be beneficial, praised cuts to federal spending, spread misinformation about the United States Agency for International Development, pushed conspiracy theories about the January 6 insurrection, and advanced other right-wing talking points. 

Hosts and guests claimed that Trump was “a brilliant marketer,” that he’s “always five, six … 10 steps ahead of the other person that he's negotiating with,” and pushed other pro-Trump messaging.

• On The Shawn Ryan Show, wealth manager Rob Luna said, “Everyone is super euphoric about what’s going to happen.” [YouTube, The Shawn Ryan Show, 1/20/25] 
• PBD Podcast co-host Vincent Oshana noted that “it’s cool to be pro-Trump.” He added, “It's cool to be in this thing because they've been — that psyop that you were talking about — for nine years, and it's still happening.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/21/25]
• Host Theo Von stated that he was “excited” when Trump ran for office, adding, “I was like, if that fucking dude can win, then anybody could could win.” [YouTube, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, 2/12/25] 
• PBD Podcast host Patrick Bet-David said trust in government will increase under Trump if he “follows through and drops what happened with MLK, Robert F. -- Robert Kennedy -- and John F. Kennedy's assassination.” He said: “When they run the poll of how much the American people trust the government, they're going to say, 'I trust the government.' But replace 'the government.' 'I trust Trump's administration' — not the U.S. government as a blanket immunity statement.” He continued, referencing a graph showing trust in government: “I think Trump has a shot on getting this thing to be a hockey stick to the roof saying, holy shit. Whether you like him or not, guess what? He's telling us what's going on, which is quite exciting.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/21/25]
• On The Joe Rogan Experience, Lex Fridman celebrated Trump as “a great dealmaker” over his negotiations with Russia and Ukraine. Fridman added that Trump “wants to end wars in all parts of the world.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 1/22/25]
• PBD Podcast co-host Adam Sosnick said he’s “excited to see what Trump [is going to do] this time around.” He said Trump is “more equipped this time around” because the administration knows “who’s loyal to the agenda” and where “the bodies are buried.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/23/25]
• All-In co-host Jason Calacanis said he is “rooting for him [Trump] wholeheartedly to do great work.” He explained, “There are aspects of the platform I like. I like probably 80% of the platform,” as co-host Chamath Palihapitiya prodded him to “just say you like him.” [YouTube, All-In, 1/24/25]
• The Tim Dillon Show host Tim Dillon stated that Trump’s “political instincts are, for the most part, pretty damn good.” Dillon also stated that Trump “understands this world, this new world that he helped create, and the people around him created. They created it with reality television, and then they created it with social media.” [YouTube, The Tim Dillon Show, 1/25/25]
• Venture capitalist and Lex Fridman Podcast guest Marc Andreessen claimed Trump is “completely transparent” and “completely honest.” [YouTube, Lex Fridman Podcast, 1/26/25] 
• Bet-David praised Trump’s negotiating skills, saying, “Trump is always five, six, you know, 10 steps ahead of the other person that he's negotiating with.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/28/25]
• Bet-David also said the “credibility” of institutions like the CIA “will go up under Trump’s administration.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/30/25]
• Streamer Adin Ross explained why he bought Trump’s cryptocurrency: “I want to do it because I support my president.” He continued, “I just love Trump. I love my president." [YouTube, Adin Ross, 2/3/25] 
• Ufologist and PBD Podcast guest Steven Greer described Trump and “those around him” as “forward-thinking.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 2/4/25] 
• On This Past Weekend, comedian Antonio Brown called Trump the “cracker of the year,” praising him for keeping “his class” and “coolness.” Brown added: “He overcame so much, and he kept his class. He kept his coolness. Imagine, he almost got killed while running for president. Almost got took down by people trying to take him to jail. You never really see a cracker really go through this type of intensity of his life and the government trying to take you down.” [YouTube, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, 2/7/25] 
• Carnivore diet promoter and PBD Podcast guest Paul Saladino said he’s “super excited about this ‘Make America Healthy Again’ movement and what Bobby’s going to do.” He added, “How inspirational would it be to the country if Trump lost 20 pounds or 30 pounds?” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 1/27/25] 
• Appearing on PBD Podcast, Blaze Media’s Glenn Beck claimed that Trump “may go down as a Lincoln, Jefferson, Washington. He may go down as the greatest president since Washington.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 2/11/25]
• Sosnick called Trump “a brilliant marketer.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 2/13/25] 

While discussing some of the proposed initiatives for Trump’s second term, hosts and guests on several shows celebrated Trump and his administration for doing “an incredible job with the border” and for having “signed 600 executive orders” on his first day, among other things.

• Jason Calacanis claimed Trump has “done an incredible job with the border,” calling it a “consensus-based issue.” He added, “So Trump now has downsizing the government and controlling immigration and getting rid of violent immigrants, has incredibly popular parts of his mandate. And that's the big win for him.” [YouTube, All-In, 1/31/25]
• The Joe Rogan Experience host Joe Rogan praised Trump for allegedly gaining a ceasefire deal in Gaza when former President Joe Biden could not. He said, “Isn't it amazing that the Biden administration had two years, couldn't get anything done, and Trump gets it done in a day? He was saying that he was going to be able to do that, and everybody dismissed it.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 1/22/25]
• On Flagrant, Ohio gubernatorial candidate and former podcast host Vivek Ramaswamy celebrated Trump’s idea of purchasing Greenland, noting, “People could debate about Greenland or anything else, but the idea of manifest destiny, the idea that we're the pioneers and the explorers, that gives us back some of that self-confidence.” Ramaswamy also claimed that Trump is “restoring that pride as an American, as an Ohioan, as a citizen, as a member of a family, revival of conviction in self.” [YouTube, Flagrant, 1/29/25]
• On his podcast, Lex Fridman said, “I think he's [Trump's] also just creating a general vibe that this is — regulation will go down and this is the era of building.” He continued, “So if you're a builder, you want to create stuff, you want to launch stuff, this is the time to do it.” [YouTube, Lex Fridman Podcast, 2/2/25] 
• On The Lex Fridman Podcast, guest Dylan Patel praised Trump’s executive orders opening up federal land for data centers, saying, “Trump has made it much easier to do this.” He added, “Trump did do some executive actions that, like, do significantly improve the ability for this to be built faster.” [YouTube, Lex Fridman Podcast, 2/2/25] 
• Impaulsive co-host Mike Majlak stated that “there’s been a lot of nonaction happening at the government level,” and that Trump came in and “signed 600 executive orders.” Majlak also called Trump’s gutting of federal agencies “the greatest experiment in the history of the country.” Co-host Logan Paul agreed, stating, “That is true,” and celebrated Trump for creating a “press event” out of signing the executive orders. [YouTube, Impaulsive, 2/4/25]
• Vincent Oshana defended potential economic pain Americans could suffer as a result of the Trump administration’s policies, saying, “America has had a dislocated shoulder for four years. Trump is the doctor that came in and reset it. … But it's going to hurt for a little while, so deal with it.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 2/11/25] 

While discussing Trump and his incoming administration, several hosts and guests engaged with right-wing narratives and misinformation around climate change, the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, immigration, and vaccines. Hosts and guests also misleadingly claimed USAID was corrupt or engaging in criminal behavior to support left-wing causes.

• Joe Rogan called Trump “eerily accurate” in his pushback to claims that climate change is responsible for wildfires. He said, “So these climate change kooks, these left-wing kooks that want to put everything into these, like, very binary categories. Like, 'This is because the Republicans refused to agree to climate change and call climate change as a hoax. This is a climate change.' No, this is LA. This is the climate in LA.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 1/23/25]
• Chamath Palihapitiya expressed support for Trump’s decision to pardon January 6 participants, calling some of the convictions “very speculative.” Palihapitiya noted, “I think what we found out since January 6 is somewhat important. I think the first thing we found out was that there were a bunch of these folks whose convictions were very speculative. I think the Supreme Court already ruled that in June of last year, it was like a six to three vote that said at least 350 of these convictions should probably just be thrown out.” [YouTube, All-In, 1/24/25]
• Tim Dillon stated that there “is an emergency at the border” and that “it is primarily an issue about the integration of people into an existing economic and cultural space, which is what a country is.” [YouTube, The Tim Dillon Show, 1/25/2
• Rogan claimed that the Trump administration “already found thousands of criminals that had snuck in here,” adding that the Biden administration “left them here, and they allowed them to stay in these sanctuary cities.” Rogan claimed that “Trump’s just yanking them out and flying them back to Colombia,” and that “the Biden administration could have done this too.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 1/31/25] 
• David Sacks, co-host of All-In, said, “Every left-wing organization in the world seems to be getting paid by this slush fund at USAID.” Sacks added, “You know, the left in general tries to portray itself as a movement of the people that is grassroots. This is the exact opposite. This is AstroTurf. This is basically money coming from the top down out of Washington to fund all of these groups, maybe not even in the United States, like all over the world.” [YouTube, All-In, 2/7/25]
• Rogan argued that “a lot of the stuff that’s listed on USAID” is “so frivolous and so fucking insane.” Rogan later clarified that he “hope[s] that the good stuff from USAID can be picked back up,” adding, “But you got to know, like, what’s fraud, you know, and how much of it is horseshit.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 2/11/25] 
• On The Joe Rogan Experience, former State Department official Mike Benz claimed that USAID has a “role in the censorship industry.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 2/12/25]
• Earlier in his episode with Benz, Rogan claimed that DOGE found “$200 million allocated to transgender experiments on monkeys,” adding, “That’s just the tip of the iceberg.” He continued, “And then the NGOs, and then that map of 50,000 NGOs that was essentially just Democratic propaganda machine that was exposed, that was all just money being funneled in a circular manner.” [YouTube, The Joe Rogan Experience, 2/12/25] 
• While appearing on The Shawn Ryan Show, Oculus VR founder Palmer Luckey said he’s “really stoked that we got Trump in office” so that the administration and the FBI can “dig into” what happened on January 6. Luckey argued that “someone has realized that it’s not a good idea to talk about whatever happened because it’s probably not what they told the public.” [YouTube, The Shawn Ryan Show, 2/14/25]
• On All-In, guest Naval Ravikant said the Biden administration “obviously” left the country “in a bad place” after COVID-19 lockdowns. He added that “the bill for that has come due.” He further argued that Trump’s tariffs are “about making sure we have a functioning middle class with good jobs.” [YouTube, All-In, 2/14/25]
• During a conversation with Mohsen Sazegara, the founder of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard, Patrick Bet-David claimed that critics of DOGE’s actions to dismantle the federal government were “losing their shit” because they “benefit from all this expenditure, wasted expenditure.” [YouTube, PBD Podcast, 2/14/25] 
• Theo Von argued in a conversation with Brookings Institution senior fellow and author Richard Reeves that there was an effort to “load states up” with new voters. After Reeves pushed back, noting that “they can’t vote,” Von doubled down, speculating that “if you legalize them, if you just bring them in and then you find a quick path to legalization, then they would be able to vote.” [YouTube, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, 2/14/25]
• On The Shawn Ryan Show, host Shawn Ryan asked, referring to the COVID-19 vaccine, “Is there anything people can do to clean their blood, or clean their system out, with prior vaccinations?” Guest Gary Brecka earlier had directed viewers to a link to purchase a book supposedly outlining “what are the viable vaccines and what are the ones to avoid,” adding, “It’s all evidence-based, and it’s not fearmongering.” [YouTube, The Shawn Ryan Show, 1/27/25]