Trump supporters are mad as hell with ‘left-wing’ Drudge Report — and creating their own aggregator sites to take him down

Unwavering devotees of President Donald Trump often have difficulty comprehending the fact that it is possible to criticize the president and still be politically conservative, and even Matt Drudge — right-wing founder of The Drudge Report — is not immune to the wrath of Trumpistas. Journalist Will Sommer, in the Daily Beast, reports that some Trump supporters have come to view Drudge as an enemy of the president and are hoping to compete with him by launching “conservative Drudge-style aggregator sites” such as Liberty Daily, NewsAmmo, WhatFinger and Rantingly.

Such sites, according to Sommer, are combining a Drudge Report-like format with overtly pro-Trump coverage that they believe is missing from Matt Drudge’s site — and they even emulate the “low-tech” three-column layout that The Drudge Report has had since the late 1990s.

In addition, the far-right social media network Gab recently unveiled the aggregator site Gab Trends “amid discontent from Trump supporters with Drudge,” Sommer reports.

Andrew Torba, founder of Gab, told the Daily Beast, “It’s what the internet is talking about right now, not what Matt Drudge thinks the internet should be talking about right now.”

Trumpistas are also accusing Twitter of having an anti-Trump bias — despite the fact that the social media platform allows him to reach 66.5 million followers and post as many offensive comments as he wants. In an October 22 tweet, Gab Trends used Twitter to attack Twitter, complaining, “Drudge and Twitter had the same anti-Trump in-your-face headline narratives today.”

Not surprisingly, Matt Drudge had no interest in being interviewed for Sommer’s article. Despite having one of the most high-traffic right-wing sites in the history of the internet, Matt Drudge has been the Greta Garbo of conservative media — in other words, famously reclusive.

So far, Sommer reports, none of the sites that view themselves as MAGA alternatives to the Drudge Report have “anywhere near” as much traffic. Sommer notes that according to SimilarWeb, the Drudge Report “received more than 80 million visitors in September.”

Moreover, Sommer adds, these MAGA alternatives are “unlikely to capture the influence Drudge has wielded over media and politics.”

“Stories highlighted by Drudge often end up making it on the cable news, and media outlets have long sought the mammoth traffic a link from the site can bring,” Sommer explains.

Nonetheless, Sommer adds, these sites could find an audience if enough Trump supporters continue to view Matt Drudge as an adversary.

Howard Polskin, who analyzes right-wing media at The Righting, told the Daily Beast, “If criticism of Drudge keeps happening, it may create an opening for one of these sites to really become much more popular with an audience.” And WhatFinger told the Beast, “Our readers are libertarians and conservatives, and they say Drudge is far too left-wing now.”