From NeverTrump to reluctant vote: One man’s media protest

Before I was a radio talk show host, I was a reporter for about a decade. I believed then, as I do now, that the role of the press is to keep the government accountable and the citizens informed.

It’s why I am critical of many journalists for the way they cover politics and culture. And it’s why I find myself very reluctantly willing to vote for Donald Trump in 2024.

I have never voted for a Republican or Democrat for president in my life. I have either voted Libertarian or abstained from voting.

I don’t consider that abstaining or voting for a third-party candidate is a “wasted vote.” It’s also not a vote for another candidate. Refusing to vote for Trump in 2016 and 2020 was not a vote for Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden. It was a tiny signal to the parties to offer better candidates. It was my personal, ineffectual protest. But it was mine.

This is not normal.

In 2016, I was a host on a conservative talk radio station in Asheville, North Carolina. Surrounded in the lineup by Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, I urged my audience not to support Trump in the primary. I spent months highlighting why Trump should not be the choice. I knew I was risking my job and my career in doing so, but I did not believe he was the best candidate in that field. And while my listening area went for Ted Cruz (barely), Trump easily carried the state.

In the general election, I believed the polling. I chastised my audience for supporting the guy who couldn’t possibly beat Clinton. It would be a blowout!

Of course, we know how that turned out. I was completely wrong. I ate a lot of crow dished up by my audience. But I vowed to cover Trump honestly — giving him praise when he deserved it and disagreeing with him when I thought he erred.

Deep institutional corruption

In the ensuing seven years, I watched the agencies of our bloated and corrupted federal government conjure all manner of attacks on the man, feeding a resistance press with false, anonymously sourced tales and accusations.

At first, it was easy to believe these stories because, as a former reporter, I could not fathom so many journalists so willing to mislead. But as story after story fell apart upon closer inspection, I grew horrified at the corruption of the institution of journalism.

The weaponization of the fabricated Steele dossier. The corrupt FBI Crossfire Hurricane operation. The denial and burying of the Hunter Biden laptop story and what it meant for our national security. The “fine people on both sides” lie that was purportedly Joe Biden’s reason for running, which no reporter ever asked him to explain.

The media promoted these stories, which gained traction as a result. When they were proven false, journalists issued no retractions and returned no industry awards. It was just another episode in the ongoing “Orange Man Bad: Threat to Democracy” series we’ve all been forced to endure for seven years now.

The most egregious example is the ongoing cover-up of Biden’s cognitive decline. I’ve documented it for years, and I’m not the only one who noticed. Yet nobody in the D.C. press corps acknowledged it — or else they all simply chose to ignore it — until that fateful debate in June.

Adding to this scandal was the Democratic Party leaders’ palace coup to replace the president in the manner they did. Adding to the insult was California Governor Gavin Newsom’s laughter over the whole corrupt process on a podcast with former Obama staffers.

This is not normal.

My vote, my choice

One thing I know for certain is that the legacy media and Beltway journalists will continue to pursue, prosecute, and hold Trump accountable. If he abuses his power, there will be investigations and repercussions.

Yes, the pursuit will be biased and deranged in many ways. But their record is clear. They will continue to work hand in glove with the same unnamed government officials “with knowledge of the story” to bring down Trump. (I suspect some are working up an AI-generated fake “pee tape” as we speak.)

But I am also certain these same people will not pursue Kamala Harris or Tim Walz with the same zeal. And that makes all the difference to me.

Because my first principle is the belief that the press must hold the government accountable, I have no faith it will do so if Harris wins. Absolutely none.

A Harris defeat would punish the media and the Democrats for their corrupt actions. I know of no other way.

This, too, will be a single, ineffectual, one-person protest vote. But it’s mine.

And for that reason, I will vote for Donald Trump. Even if I am not happy about it.