In wake of Charlottesville attack, conservative Drudge Report turns against Donald Trump
Drudge Report has spent the past twenty-plus years prominently pushing the conservative political agenda, and the site has been a major supporter of Donald Trump along the way. As Trump has unraveled in office and his popularity has sunk, there have been a few recent instances of Drudge’s support for Trump seeming to soften. But in the wake of the Charlottesville attack and Trump’s weak response to it, Drudge Report now appears to have turned against Trump entirely.
Here’s what the front-and-center of the Drudge Report home page looks like as of right now. This is the precise opposite of the kind of headline you might expect from the site:
Drudge Report is mocking Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan by invoking the “Make America Hate Again” version of it that Trump’s detractors have long been using. This is a remarkable development, in that Drudge is essentially acknowledging the hateful and racist and divisive rhetoric from Trump which led to the deadly Charlottesville terrorist attack. This comes far too late for Drudge to score any points with the anti-Trump crowd, but he’s not worried about them one way or the other. The point is that Drudge is now clearly hedging its bets when it comes to its own conservative audience.
Matt Drudge knows his audience. He previously bet that he could score big with them by getting on the Donald Trump train. Now he seems to be betting that an already unraveling Trump will be hurt badly by this latest incident, and that he can score with his own audience by going against Trump. Considering that Drudge’s audience is made up entirely of Republicans and conservatives, this can be interpreted as a sign that there’s now more to be gained on that side of the fence by kicking Trump than by continuing to prop him up.
