AlterNet - 'The first rule of MAGA': Why 'Trump apologists' are finding reality 'increasingly untenable'

Alex Henderson
May 14, 2025 | 11:00:53 UTC

Right-wing media pundit Ben Shapiro is very much an example of what writers at The Bulwark (a website run by Never Trump conservatives) call an "anti-anti-Trumper."

Shapiro isn't ultra-MAGA in his views like "War Room" host Steve Bannon or the staff at Breitbart Media, but he isn't in the Never Trump camp either. Never Trumpers, in 2024, argued that while they had some policy disagreements with then-President Joe Biden and then-Vice President Kamala Harris, they considered them far preferable to Trump; "anti-anti-Trumpers" like Shapiro, in contrast, weren't MAGA but considered Trump preferable to Democrats.

Yet some of Trump's policies — steep tariffs, a fondness for Russian President Vladimir Putin, protectionism, isolationism — fly in the face of what pre-MAGA conservatives preached for decades.

In an article published on May 14, Salon's Amanda Marcotte stresses that Shapiro finds himself in a difficult position: He's under pressure to shill for Trump even when it comes to positions he strongly disagrees with.

"No one was more relieved than Daily Wire commentator Ben Shapiro when Donald Trump announced a 90-day 'pause' on Chinese tariffs," Marcotte explains. "Scare quotes around 'pause,' because there will still be a 30 percent tariff on Chinese goods, which economist Paul Krugman characterized as 'really, really high.' But Shapiro has been getting a lot of grief in recent days from his audience for ever-so-slightly acknowledging a reality everyone outside the MAGA bubble can see: Trump's tariff impulses — which hardly rise to the level of 'policy' — are both stupid and dangerous."

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