On The Dean Obeidallah Show, Angelo Carusone discusses the effect MAGA media fractures will have on the midterm elections
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On The Dean Obeidallah Show, Angelo Carusone discusses the effect MAGA media fractures will have on the midterm elections
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From the April 16, 2026, edition of SiriusXM's The Dean Obeidallah Show
DEAN OBEIDALLAH (HOST): We're seeing the fight with Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly. When she actually goes against Trump a few times, sometimes I go, my colleague, Megyn Kelly, because we're both --
ANGELO CARUSONE (MEDIA MATTERS PRESIDENT): Yeah.
OBEIDALLAH: But, generally, I'm, like, I want nothing to do with her. But how real is this? Like, what can you share in the last few minutes about, is it meaningful this divide that we're seeing, or is it people getting more attention in the media that helps their own brand?
CARUSONE: Yeah. Look, it is significant. And the net effect of it is that you don't have people that are going to backfill for you and carry water for you. And if they're not, you know, they're attacking you here, but it means they're less likely to eat your dog food elsewhere.
And, you know, that alone is not going to be the effect on Trump, but what to me -- so that's one significance. The short term is that it makes it harder for him to do the things that he normally does and to poison the political reality. I think the real tell here is less about what happens in 2026. It's actually that this is the future of contours of our political landscape as it heads into 2028.
And that's what I think the significance is, is that we're beginning to see like, I think, for example, as a part of this, MAHA is the most durable part of the of the MAGA coalition. And, you know, right before Iran, there was a big blowup in that community and in the MAGA space over glyphosate, which is the key ingredient in Roundup. And they were pretty mad at Trump for that because he used the Defense Production Act to require more production of it, and we're still seeing some of the remnants of that. And this Iran blowup is sort of a tie-in there. It's that it comes from the conversation the first big fracture we saw in October over Nick Fuentes, Tucker Carlson, and the Heritage Foundation. The real question here is, what is the role of Israel? And that is becoming a big litmus test for future power, and it's going to be a key issue as we move into 2028.
So I think that's where the "so what" is. In the short term, it affects Trump's coalition a little bit. You could start to see where the kinetic energy is, and I do think that matters, for how you can flex and organize political power. Some of them are just doing it for attention. Like, Megyn Kelly is not a lead steerer. She's not driving the conversation. She's echoing it. She's getting some, you know, she's -- but she's not doing anything new. She's not a difference maker in this context.
But, and a lot of them are still saying, hey, if I had to hold my nose, I'd vote for Trump. But they are weakening his narrative dominance, his storytelling engine. But I think the more important part of all of this is that everything is being resorted and reshuffled, and we're beginning to see at least a keyhole view of what 2028's landscape's going to look like.