Maddow’s typical fan has been branded (by Kat Stoeffel in The New York Times) as the “MSNBC Mom,” a woman who feels that the election has radicalized her; even if she has not moved to the left politically, her liberal sympathies and news consumption have swelled into a suddenly central part of her identity. (The network has monetized this lightly condescending label with a set of MSNBC Mom tote bags and latte mugs.) Molly Jong-Fast, a former novelist who once described her pre-Trump self as “completely selfish and disinterested in politics” and who is now a liberal Twitter influencer and columnist for the Never Trump site The Bulwark, told me that Maddow “made wonkiness cool.”

Recently, I went to dinner at the home of Rebecca Kee, a preschool principal in San Francisco who turned to Maddow in her depression and confusion over the 2016 election. I brought a bottle of rosé, and she poured it into glasses decorated with charms that featured Russia-investigation figures on one side and characters from “Star Trek: The Next Generation” on the other. I sipped from the Hope Hicks/Beverly Crusher glass, and we watched Maddow’s show over veggie enchiladas. “I think of her as a news doula: You know the news is going to be painful no matter what, so we might as well have someone who helps us survive it,” Kee told me. Last year, Kee had a Maddow-themed birthday party, at which her friends and her two young sons put on big black glasses and slicked their hair to the side. Also in attendance was a life-size cardboard cutout of Maddow, which is now in storage so as not to startle guests.

On TV, Maddow appears in slim black blazers over black shirts. She wears smoky eye shadow and subtly glossy lipstick, and her short hair is swept elegantly away from her forehead. The only tell that her business-casual femininity is a mirage created for television is that she has not modified her look for 11 years. It is a uniform she selected for work and steps into every day, so that she never has to make an aesthetic choice that can be picked apart by the commentariat and elevated above what she has to say. When the show is over, she wipes off her makeup, removes her contacts and changes into her civilian clothing.

When I picked her up from rehab, she wore glasses, a denim shirt and jeans, and a vintage belt buckle engraved with the words “Texas Nuclear,” signaling one of her obsessions: This month, she publishes her second book, “Blowout,” about the political impact of the oil-and-gas industry. She has described herself as “a cross between the jock and the antisocial girl who bit people” in a John Hughes film, and it tracks: She could be the love child of Ally Sheedy and Emilio Estevez.

“This is the hardest part of my day,” Maddow said as she approached the nickel-bronze revolving doors of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, before lifting her crutches and hopping easily through the obstacle. Just as she approached the threshold of the secure elevator bank, Maddow was detained by another fan, who pulled her back into the lobby for one more selfie.

“People think I have secret information,” Maddow told me. “I definitely get the instant, like, But what’s the real story?” Recently, she said on air that she expects more Democratic candidates to drop out of the presidential race soon, and she had to instantly clarify that she was not some kind of soothsayer divining answers from the wonk crystal ball that she keeps tucked under the anchor desk. When she told me this, she waved her arms in front of her, as if wielding a pair of orange safety batons on the tarmac of her reputation. Then she mimicked herself desperately trying to ground her viewers: “I don’t know that any candidate is going to drop out! I am just surmising from publicly available data!”