The Devil’s Bargain Went Down to Georgia
By: Brian Bannon
Tags: Steve Bannon, NPR, Georgia Politics, Media Criticism

“Oracle of the Deplorables”

John Fredericks has been broadcasting his own morning radio show from Georgia for several weeks and recently launched a Georgia edition of his Star News network of digital newspapers.

A self-described “oracle of the deplorables,” he has been explicit in criticizing the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and in challenging radio host Erick Erickson as a former ‘Never Trumper’ whose eventual support for the president was never sincere.

Frederick’s has been touring extensively including to cities outside of Atlanta. Places where newspapers have shrunk and outlets seeking affluent or young demographics have mostly abandoned save for the “what do these Trump supporters in a small-town diner think” stories every few months.

In Georgia, Fredericks’ and Bannon’s radio shows are only available via stream, but Fredericks is asking for contributions from listeners with promises of buying a radio station in the state.

The John Fredericks Radio network currently includes several stations in Virginia. Some are also owned under the name MAGA Radio Network.

The liberal watchdog Media Matters describes Star News as “a growing network of partisan websites that dress up right-wing media content and talking points to look like local news. The organization’s explicit aim is to deliver pro-Trump propaganda to residents of battleground states, coating local news in the same grievance- and conspiracy-filled vernacular as is used by outlets like The Daily Caller and Breitbart.”

Media Matters also posted its own article on Nov. 24th about conservative hosts critical of Georgia Republicans and Erickson.

While these Georgia MAGA media efforts are still dwarfed by the ratings and reach of the state’s legacy newspapers and radio, a sign of its influence is the number of state legislators who have appeared on Fredericks’ radio show, signed on to various calls for a special session, and lent their names to fruitless amicus briefs.

In those interviews, the legislators tend to mention the large volume of calls and constituent pressure they are getting. “A lot of folks are angry.”

In addition, some state politicians and the state Republican party itself are now advertisers on Georgia Star News.

Is it to reach conservative voters or a kind of protection money?

Or just a cruder version of what Fox News and WSB radio have done for years.

As I’ve been arguing for some time, Fox News, Erick Erickson and Cox Media Group’s talk radio stations WSB in Atlanta and WGAU in Athens have long had ethically questionable relationships with state Republican leaders.

But now, with President Trump himself attacking many of those leaders, such access and exclusive interviews are a sign of swamp-like corruption.

To Bannon’s War Room brethren, a state with Republican majorities in both houses of the state legislature and a lock on all statewide offices should not have flipped to Biden.

That its Republican establishment is unwilling to use all aspects of its power, from demanding resignations to calling a special session to criminal investigations of voting rights groups is a sign of the Republic’s decline.

And for conservative media to not go all in for Trump now, is betrayal.