If Trump Loses Big, Can Talk Radio Survive?

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Long-time WTMJ conservative talk show host Charlie Sykes recently announced he was retiring from radio. The 62-year old has hosted mid-mornings on WTMJ for 23 years and has been one of the most listened-to talk show hosts in the Midwest. Over the years Sykes established himself as one of the most credible conservative hosts in the Milwaukee and surrounding areas, and as a result he has a lot of sway with listeners and elected officials. We spoke to Sykes about the Presidential election and the impact it will have on talk radio once all the votes have been counted. He believes Donald Trump will lose big in November, and the Trump phenomenon will lead to a day of reckoning for conservative talkers.

RI: Where is Political Talk headed?
Sykes: This has been a difficult year for conservative talk. I’m not sure where it goes after this year. I think the conservative media has definitely been fractured by the Trump phenomenon. There’s going to be a reckoning afterwards, after this election. Unfortunately, a number of the national hosts sacrificed a good deal of their credibility. This is a medium where if you sacrifice your credibility, it becomes very difficult to get it back. That is our main asset—that sense of trust. If large segments of the talk radio market believe their trust has been violated by some of the hosts… and I am talking particularly of some of the national hosts, I think that there will be a real fallout from that.

RI: How did they damage their credibility?
Sykes: Other hosts decided they were going to be essentially propagandists forDonald Trump someone who was really, in so many ways, inconsistent with what they claimed to be in other years. The thing about Wisconsin talk radio, it was always very idea-based, always policy-based. We had a really interesting network of people. I’m not the only talk show host in southeast Wisconsin. I think that we actually did talk about what it meant to be a conservative, what a limited government meant, what reform meant. You have people like Paul Ryan, one of the most thoughtful conservatives in the country, as a regular guest. So there’s a real contrast between what we did here, and I think some of the national folks, who really apparently did think the “entertainment ” ratings-driven approach to politics was actually more important than the principle basis of what we were doing.

RI: How did this happen, that we are where we are in this election?
Sykes: That’s something I am going to try to figure out. During the primary, obviously my listeners in southeastern Wisconsin were very skeptical of Donald Trump. Here is Wisconsin, he was not popular. I think most of the talk show hosts, including me, were anti-Trump. As a result, he lost here, badly, as you may recall. I think that it was kind of a reflection of the different approach to these things that people in Milwaukee and southeastern Wisconsin had. But I will be honest with you, after the convention, I do think a lot of our listeners did not want to hear criticism of Donald Trump. They felt that it was our obligation to carry water for him. I never thought that the role of talk radio was to carry water for a personality as opposed to advancing certain issues. I am quite candid about the fact that I am sure that I lost some listeners who felt that I should’ve dropped my opposition to Trump after the nomination.

RI: Can talk radio survive?
Sykes: I think so. They will. How it will play out, I don’t know. Certainly here in southeastern Wisconsin, I think that we still have a lot of trust in hosts. Plus, I think conservatives are certainly still skeptical of the mainstream media and will look to talk show hosts as gatekeepers when it comes to primary fights. But, it will be different. I’m not sure how it’s going to be different. No one knows what the political landscape is going to look like on November 9th. Nobody knows where the conservative media goes. Up until this year, there was a, I would say, relatively unified conservative media, both print and electronic. That certainly has not survived this campaign.

Sean HannityConservative talker Sean Hannity will be a keynote speaker at Radio Ink’s Forecast next month. See our full agenda HERE

10 COMMENTS

  1. Seems from here: So long as a large, already-polarized audience can be salved and saved by a barrage of balls, bravado and bull****, conservative talk-radio is likely to survive. Mr. Trump is the ideal standard-bearer for that constituency.
    I am reminded of the advertainments for Dean Martin’s roasts. Foster Brooks’ reeling drunk is a hilarious character. But, as a single-schtick performer, he does wear after a while.
    No matter. It was still a nice living.
    Besides, the conservative talkers are so much more adept at riling up the locals whereas the progressives present as too smart for their own damn good.
    So long as radio remembers to be emotionally-charged, there will be a supportive audience. Content is secondary.

  2. Here’s a novel idea…how about some talk station that DON’T focus exclusively on conservative Republican talking points?

    Yeah, I know…never happen…

  3. Charlie should be the last to talk about credibility. All these other talk show hosts would have supported/ “carried water for” the Republican nominee no matter who it was. Charlie has a personal reason to not want Trump to win- his ex-wife(look up why she’s an ex) is on Trump’s SCOTUS list. I doubt very much he wants to be around if Trump wins and that is discussed nationally.

    Then you have his carrying the water for Paul Ryan..wouldn’t allow Ryan’s opponent to be on the show- even bashed him constantly.

  4. The United States is rapidly changing. Caucasians will not even be the majority of the population within 10 years. The old, white, conservative population is literally dying off, everyday. AM radio radio is dying because it is relevant primarily only to 60+ year-old white conservatives, and in general advertisers do not care about reaching that group.

  5. I don’t think that talk radio will have trouble if Hillary wins; I think a Trump victory would be far more disastrous for talk radio. For the last 8 years, talkers like Sykes and Hannity etc have made their bones (and a huge amount of money) by slamming Democrats. If Trump wins, then most likely congress will stay the same, and all of these talkers will get what they said they wanted. I can’t possibly imagine that they would turn around and start slamming the Republicans in office; whatever would they have to talk about? Would their listeners care to hear “happy talk” about their guys in office? Would they spend the next few years talking about how bad Obama WAS?

  6. I have to agree with Charlie here. After the 2008 election, the conservative talk radio crowd spent 4 years trying to take out Obama in the next election. Obama wins, and then what? They spent another 4 years trying to discredit him and then prop up Trump. If Trump loses, which looks likely at the time, then what? While the rest of the world moves forward, the prominent voices of talk radio will spend another 4 years trying to take out Hillary in 2020… a mindset that will be 12-years-old by then, and making AM talk die on the vine. Talk radio will survive, but it can’t keep doing what it’s doing. Unfortunately with the way the broadcast industry is (pushing whatever brings ratings vs. promoting ideas), I’m not going to hold my breath on some sort of revelation going on in hosts’ head.

  7. Conservative Talk Radio has survived 8 years of Obama and will survive 4 years of Hillary. Talkers like Rush and Hannity keep us hopeful and sane. Whether our country will survive is another question.

  8. Charlie’s a good man, but he’s wrong on any impact on conservative talk radio if Trump loses. Remember, Trump was pulling ahead a few weeks ago until The Washington Post, who had assigned 16 full-time reporters to unearth dirt on Trump, came up with the 2006 boy’s talk story and sank Trump with undecided women. The electorate is still not happy with a President Hillary Clinton looming. It would have preferred a conservative Republican had surfaced, someone other than Trump, to lead the nation. The only people who will be happy at Hillary’s inaugural are middle-aged and old women whose philandering husbands soured them on men years ago.

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