Donald Trump has transformed conservative media as much as he has Republican politics. An establishment once the province of tweedy editorialists and the mannered heirs of William F. Buckley has been overthrown by a new set of brash characters, from name-brand provocateurs like Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham to a younger generation making their mark in social media.

Politico director of photography M. Scott Mahaskey traveled the country to meet the leading figures of this new conservative establishment on their own turf, interviewing and spending time with them in the studio, at home and even on the gun range. They include fast-rising online stars like Ben Shapiro, the cerebral 34-year-old Daily Wire editor with a massively popular podcast, and Allie Stuckey, the self-styled “millennial conservative” with her own podcast and a slick web series to boot. Mahaskey also visited National Rifle Association spokesperson Dana Loesch on the gun range, where she fired rounds from an AR-15 and an American flag-emblazoned pistol.


It’s a boisterous and unapologetic bunch, mostly but not all pro-Trump. If they share one unifying trait, it’s their appetite for courting controversy and baiting liberals—one that connects viscerally to a wide swath of conservative Americans eager to see political correctness and the “mainstream media” taken down a peg or two. Tucker Carlson, who has remade himself from bowtie-wearing gadfly to something closer to Hannity’s pugilistic everyman, summed up the new political climate this way: “chaos, basically, that will sort itself out into a new order.” In the conservative media world, it already has.

M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Ben Shapiro

Podcaster and syndicated radio host; editor-in-chief, The Daily Wire.

Photographed at his studio in Los Angeles.

“We’re incredibly polarized. But I think there’s a grand search for meaning that’s just beginning—and I’m optimistic that we’ll find some of the same answers the founders did, while acknowledging the shortcomings of their time and place.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Sean Hannity

Host, Fox News and syndicated radio show.

Photographed at the Fox studios in New York.

“My role is to do [journalists’] job that they are not doing every night, and I feel I do that. … I’m basically for the truth, whatever the truth is, and that’s what I’m looking for. And I want the country to be a better place.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Allie Stuckey

Podcaster; webseries host; host, CRTV.

Photographed at her home and studio outside Dallas.

“So many of the arguments being made today are void of any reason and are instead characterized by sheer emotion. If someone disagrees with you now, it’s not just that you’re wrong—it’s that you’re a bad person.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Mark Levin

Host, Fox News and syndicated radio show; host, CRTV.

Photographed at his studio in Virginia.

“I’m very concerned the nation is unmoored from our constitutional system. … Even basic human rights, as expressed in the Bill of Rights and other places, are not really being embraced by a lot of people.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Liz Wheeler

Host, One America News Network.

Photographed at the OANN studio in San Diego, California.

“We’re at a point that we’re replacing God with government. So, instead of debating theology, instead of debating family, we’re looking at government and looking to politics for the answers—and that’s why everyone is so obsessed with it.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Tucker Carlson

Host, Fox News.

Photographed at the Fox studios in Washington.

“I try to be an explainer. I hope that’s what I can be.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Laura Ingraham

Host, Fox News and syndicated radio show.

Photographed at the Fox studios in Washington.

“President Trump is forcing most everyone in politics to show their cards—and that’s a good thing.”









M. Scott Mahaskey/POLITICO

Dana Loesch

Syndicated radio host; NRA spokesperson.

Photographed at Crossfire Defense Academy & Range, Flower Mound, Texas.