His anti-Trump stances have come at a cost. Though his show is still rated among the top 10 for talk radio, he no longer has as large a national following after several major stations in markets like New York City and Washington took him off the air. His live show is now only one hour, cut back from three last year.

Mr. Savage has always been an eccentric character in the world of conservative talk radio. His background is not in politics but plants. He studied medicinal properties in plants in Hawaii and Fiji and earned a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, in nutritional ethnomedicine, a field that examines how various cultures and ethnicities use natural products for health purposes. His affinity for the Bay Area is one that few conservatives share.

He wrote numerous books about health under his birth name, Michael Alan Weiner. He picked Savage as his radio name after Charles Savage, a sailor who is believed to be the first to introduce firearms to Fiji but was eventually murdered by the islanders.

Mr. Savage turned to radio, he said, after being denied repeatedly for jobs as a professor. “White males need not apply,” he said. “And I remember to this day the humiliation.”

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Though he is disillusioned with the Trump administration in many ways, he still takes pride in his role as an early supporter. He often tells the story about the evening in 2017 when he visited Mar-a-Lago as a guest of Christopher Ruddy, the president’s friend and chief executive of Newsmax. When Mr. Trump saw Mr. Savage, he threw his arm around him and said loudly enough for anyone within earshot to hear, “I wouldn’t be president without this man.”

Mr. Savage insists he does not need or crave that kind of access anymore. He believes enough people in his audience would see through it as phony if he did, he said, because they appreciate his independence even if they don’t share his skepticism.

“The day they think I’ve been turned and I’m willing to sell myself out for a pat on the head or another piece of Hanukkah candy,” he said, “they’re going to say he’s just like the rest of them. ‘He’ll do anything for access to the king.’”