Van Jones, an ex-adviser to former President Barack Obama and current CNN political commentator, said on Friday that President-elect Donald Trump is “smarter” than all his critics.
In a video posted to political commentator Chris Cillizza’s YouTube channel on Friday, he asked Jones, “How the hell did Donald Trump figure out the mainstream media is the fringe and the fringe is now the mainstream?”
Trump’s election win against Vice President Kamala Harris is credited in part to the rise of right-wing non-traditional media. “The booming right-wing influencer ecosystem helped reelect Donald Trump,” The Atlantic‘s Spencer Kornhaber wrote in an article published two days after the election titled, “Why Democrats Are Losing the Culture War.”
The president-elect’s nearly three-hour-long interview with podcaster Joe Rogan in late October comes to mind when thinking about his use of alternative media channels. Rogan, whose podcast The Joe Rogan Experience draws in millions of listeners, went on to endorse Trump on the eve of Election Day. Harris, while doing her own media blitz during the election with both traditional and non-traditional media, did not appear on Rogan’s podcast.
“I mean the problem is, you have a framework in your mind, ‘How can Donald Trump? How can Donald Trump? How can Donald Trump?’ Guys, can we cut it out? Donald Trump is not an idiot. Let me just be very clear. Donald Trump is smarter than me, you, and all of his critics. You know how I know? Because he has the White House, the Senate, the House, the Supreme Court, the popular vote,” Jones, who worked under the Obama administration as an adviser on green jobs before resigning in 2009, told Cillizza.
The GOP took control of the Senate, with 53 Republicans to 47 Democrats and the House with 220 Republicans and 215 Democrats in this year’s election. Meanwhile, as of Sunday, Trump has received 2.4 million more votes than Harris (77,168,458 to 74,749,891). When broken down into percentages, Trump has gotten 49.9 percent of the popular vote compared to Harris’ 48.3 percent. Meanwhile, during his first term in office, Trump nominated three conservative-leaning Supreme Court justices, tilting the Court in his party’s favor.
“[Trump] has a massive media ecosystem bigger than the mainstream built around him and for him and a religious fervor in a political movement around him. And his best buddy is the richest person in the history of the world, and the most relevant Kennedy is with him,” Jones said on Friday.
The former adviser was referring to tech billionaire Elon Musk, who Trump tapped to lead his proposed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) with biotech entrepreneur and former 2024 Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a former 2024 independent presidential candidate who Trump picked to be the new health and human services secretary,
“This dude is a phenomenon. He is the most powerful human on earth and in our lifetime. And we’re still saying, ‘Well, how is this guy?’ We look like idiots to ordinary people,” Jones said.
Newsweek reached out to Trump’s transition team via email for comment Sunday afternoon.
This week, Trump was announced to be Time magazine’s “Person of the Year.” During a recent interview for the annual issue, Trump was asked if Harris made any tactical mistakes that cost her the election.
He replied: “I think that when she wouldn’t talk to anybody, it shone a light on her. In other words, if she would have gone out and just did interviews…And people said, ‘Is there something wrong with her?’ Why would they? I mean, I’m doing this interview with you. I did interviews with, if I had the time, anybody that would ask, I’d do interviews. I think the Joe Rogan interview, you know, that went on for almost three-and-a-half-hours.”
Oleg Nikishin/Getty Images
