Trump Is Losing The Manosphere As The Mid-Terms Approach

One of the disappointments of the 2024 election was the swing of young male voters, especially the less educated, to the Felon.  As a piece in The New Republic lays out, this was not something that just happened. Rather it was the result of organized use of podcasters and so-called influencers who both depicted the Felon as take charge "alpha male" and who played to the prejudices and insecurities of this demographic.  Now, with many of the Epstein files still being hidden by the Felon's DOJ, the campaign promises of lower prices broken, and the USA locked in an unpopular war that appears to have no exit, there is a great deal of buyer's remorse within the so-called manosphere. Indeed, a number of influential podcasters and influencers have begun abandon the Felon and, in some instances, trashing his policies and accusing him of betrayal.  Higher prices from the insane trade war with Canada could well push others within the demographic to realize they were played for fools.  With the 2026 mid-terms bearing down, the loss of this young male support could truly harm congressional Republicans who continue to lack the spine to stand up to the Felon.  Here are article highlights:

Donald Trump has lost his war in reality and virtual reality, not only with Iran but also in the arena where he thought he was the eternal master, in image and myth. He has lost it on land, sea, and air—and in thin air. He has lost his war both physically and metaphorically. He has lost it in the Strait of Hormuz, but perhaps equally dangerous for his political survival, he has lost it in his manosphere.

Trump’s Iran war has shattered the once awestruck projection of him as the invulnerable alpha male. “There’s no one like that guy,” said Joe Rogan. “It’s the only reason why he survived all the shit they tried to put him through.” Now, symptomatic of the breakdown of Trump’s once seemingly granitic support along generational and ideological lines, Rogan calls the war “crazy,” “insane,” “nuts”; says Trump has “betrayed” his followers, and that Trump is blithering along with “no clear way to resolve this at all.”

The manosphere emerged in the 2024 campaign as an innovative component at the center of Trump’s political machine, a network of podcasters, influencers, and shock jocks serving as a pipeline to young men, exploiting their social and economic anxieties, particularly by targeting them with crude misogynist messages serving as vicarious defiance against an oppressive, woke feminist culture. 

The theory claiming a fundamental realignment of American politics in the 2024 election was based on the stunning statistic of 56 percent of young men in the 18 to 30-year-old demographic lurching rightward toward Trump—the exact percent that voted for Joe Biden in 2020 and had supposedly given the Democrats a secure advantage. The manosphere was credited for engineering the reversal.

Barron Trump, the youngest son and least likely to play a significant political role, managed to insert himself as a go-between. Cloistered and cosseted, overseen by Melania supposedly hovering as a helicopter mom, he was an odd, extraordinarily privileged exemplar of the socially isolated and awkward young men who became addicted listeners of the transgressive talkers blasting outrageous riffs on how to escape the domination of overbearing women. He was the target audience. His foray was his attempt to take on an identity without breaking out of his cocoon.

Barron initiated the formation of the Trump manosphere by reaching out to the most notorious operators of them all, the Tate brothers. Their reputation preceded them. The Tates had attracted one of the sphere’s largest followings, numbering beyond 10 million. . . . Through Barron, the Tates geared up their networks for Trump, galvanizing the pupils of their Hustlers University who matriculated for Ph.D.s, “pimping hoes degrees,” and the Tates’ more elite $8,000 membership fee “War Room.” “I’m very close with the Trump family,” said Andrew Tate. 

Barron kick-started the manosphere campaign in April 2024, hosting a dinner of influencers at Mar-a-Lago, including Tate’s business partner, Justin Waller, who calls himself “the third Tate brother.” . . . Waller ran a centralized command structure with a military-style hierarchy of “generals” and “operators” coordinating a network of content creators to push the MAGA line. The Tates and the others transformed their operations using them to transmit digital Trump memes and messages hundreds of millions of times. Millions of campaign dollars were siphoned to the Nelk Boys, podcasters who were close allies of the Tates, granted repeated interviews with Trump and speaking at his rallies.

The manosphere effort also brought in a Republican operative, Alex Bruesewitz, 28 years old, to work closely with Barron. Bruesewitz’s sterling credential was having been a former organizer of the “Stop the Steal” group that sought to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election and to help plan the January 6 rally in 2021. When Bruesewitz was questioned by the Congressional Committee on the January 6 Insurrection about his activities, he repeatedly invoked the Fifth Amendment on the advice of his counsel . . . .

After the campaign, Bruesewitz became a consultant to Trump’s personal political action committee, Never Surrender, Inc., which paid him to serve as the chief outside media adviser for the Trump White House, working hand in glove with the communications office to produce AI-generated videos depicting Trump as a strongman. . . . . Trump’s image has always been a centerpiece of the manosphere. He was idealized as the paragon of uber-masculinity, supreme domination, and physical strength: the alpha male.

On election night, the blowhards of the manosphere were kings of the world. At his victory party, Trump turned the stage over to Dana White, CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship, who called the roll of the manosphere heroes to thank them. At Trump’s inauguration, they were accorded seats of honor alongside the tech lords, front and center as the new powers that be. The influencers were hailed as the ultimate realignment champions.

At the core of the manosphere, however, was an alleged transnational criminal syndicate, charged with human trafficking, sexual violence, and money laundering. The very same operations that were purposed for the Trump campaign were simultaneously fronts to coerce women into sex work, where women claimed they were beaten and even strangled to the point of unconsciousness during sex.   

The first cracks in the manosphere edifice opened over the Epstein files. By May of this year, Rogan accused Trump of “trying to gaslight you on that.” Rogan railed on his show on June 16, “It’s like sometimes you just get fed up. Like, where the fuck are these Epstein files? The fuck is this? Why is this redacted? Where is it?”

For many of the manosphere performers, the war was the decisive event that shifted their tone from adulation to betrayal. Theo Von, a standup comedian turned podcaster, had been perhaps Barron’s favorite. . . . . There he was at the inauguration, and few months later in May 2025 there he was again at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar where Trump introduced him to entertain the troops. “I want to influence you to clap for a man who’s a great influencer,” Trump said. Theo Von was supposed to be the manosphere’s Bob Hope. 

“I can’t believe we went to this war,” Von bemoaned after Trump launched it. “When we started bombing Iran, I was like, ‘This can’t be true.’” The jokester felt he had been pranked. By April, Von called Trump’s war “diabolical” and “insane.”

Upon the Tates’ return from Russia, Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service charged them on July 19 with 59 counts of human trafficking, rape, and child pornography. They were arrested in Miami and held for extradition. The White House went silent. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt stated there were no plans to intervene.

The Tates’ lawyer, Joe McBride, issued a warning to Trump. “Andrew Tate was a material participant in ensuring President Trump’s victory,” he said. “And if Trump doesn’t support him, and if the next people who are going to be running for office potentially are just like, yeah, down the river he goes, that young cohort of people will break with the Republican Party in the next election.”

If the Republicans lose the midterm elections, in part having alienated the constituency that returned Trump to the White House, the manosphere will become the subject of an intense congressional investigation. . . . . Ansari told me that if and when the Democrats are the in majority, she would seek to systematically unravel the network that exercised influence, beginning with members of the Trump family, in order to shield the Tate brothers. Barron Trump, the most protected son, is exposed as a midterm campaign issue and beyond that, perhaps one day as a witness under oath.

Trump, then, is at war with the world he has made. Alex Bruesewitz, working busily with the White House trolls, now churns out videos of Trump to prop up his image as the alpha male.

The Iranians, for their part, have produced viral, AI-generated videos to portray Trump as a petulant and impotent Lego character. The Iranian Trump figure naps at the Resolute Desk, frantically launches missiles to hide his name in the Epstein files, and sweats playing dice in a casino. The Iranian portrayal of the little plastic toy is far more realistic than the White House fantasies.

Trump’s response to his insoluble quandary is to launch a new crusade. His latest war is against an even more implacable adversary than Iran. His enemy now is time. He posts photos of himself with captions reading: “President Trump gets YOUNGER!” and “President Trump ages in reverse!”