Democrats and legacy media outlets alike are failing to meet the urgency of the current moment, leaving it to independent media to pick up the slack.
That’s where Brian Tyler Cohen comes in. A political commentator with 4.5 million subscribers on YouTube, Cohen sat down with The Daily Beast Podcast host and Chief Creative and Content Officer Joanna Coles to discuss the role independent media outlets and commentators can play in a new ecosystem where the old rules no longer apply.
Cohen began covering the Trump administration during Trump’s first term, and quickly realized there was a gap in the market for left-wing video content. As he explains, “I had some experience in front of the camera, so I figured if I’m only getting served right-wing content, I’m just gonna start making this content on my own and putting it out there and see how it does.”
Now, working for himself means that he has full autonomy, which has allowed him to grow his platform and become one of the most popular progressive personalities on YouTube.
This independence has also enabled him to try and meet the current moment with the urgency it requires, something Cohen feels both establishment Democrats and legacy media have failed to do.
“I wish that the people who hid behind slogans like ‘Democracy dies in darkness‘ were able to meet the urgency of this moment and to recognize that, okay, if democracy is gonna die in darkness, then it’s everybody in the media’s responsibility to actually call out what’s happening,” Cohen told Coles.
“Democracy dies in darkness” is the slogan of the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post. In February, Bezos announced that the Post’s opinion pages would shift to focusing on “personal liberties and free markets,“ and just this week, reports emerged that Bezos was attempting to capitalize on President Donald Trump’s falling out with Tesla CEO Elon Musk in an attempt to secure more government contracts for his space tech company, Blue Origin.
Cohen argues that legacy media outlets have continued to use the same playbooks as they have in the past to respond to Trump’s second term, which doesn’t work, “because we’re in a different moment. And it requires fighting in a different way than we have fought before.”
“Republicans get that. They get how to adapt to this moment, how to adapt to the Trumpism of it all, and how to fight with everything they’ve got, because they know that their goal at the end of this is to consolidate power for themselves,” Cohen explains.
Unfortunately, “the left and the media doesn’t seem to get it. We seem to be stuck in this idea that we can usher in some bygone era of bipartisanship or compromise, and we’re just not there anymore,” he argues.
In doing this, they’re not only failing to meet the moment, but “actually giving a green light to the worst actors in government to know that we’re just not able to do what needs to be done to confront them.”
There’s an asymmetry in how Republicans and Democrats use the media, Cohen argues: Democrats continue to rely on legacy media outlets like MSNBC, CNN, and The New York Times, while Republicans realized they “weren’t getting what they needed from liberal media,” and began creating their own outlets instead: Fox News, OAN, Newsmax, The Daily Wire, as well as personalities like Alex Jones, to name a few.
As a result, Democrats are now “sprinting from behind to try and create parity,” but having only recently realized the problem exists, it’s now “a matter of whether we’re going to be able to have the tools to fight back and build up our presence where people actually are getting their news.”
In addition to the role independent left-wing media can play going forward, Cohen is also hopeful about potential challengers to Trump who are emerging in the Democratic Party, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, and Maryland Governor Wes Moore.
Cohen says that these men, particularly Newsom and Buttigieg, “know how to get into uncomfortable spaces,” with Newsom having already established a reputation as a fighter eager to tackle Republicans head-on. Buttigieg, meanwhile, “is probably the best-spoken politician that we have,” and while Moore is largely unknown, that could work in his favor, alongside his natural charisma.
Cohen also sees Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) as the future of the party, and believes that Democrats “should be elevating her every chance we get.”
As for whether the U.S. will make it to 2028 with its democracy still intact, Cohen believes, “if we have Democrats who are willing to fight with everything they’ve got and not kind of defer to this bygone era of our friends on the other side of the aisle, if we have people who are truly looking to exercise the full strength of the party, the courts, the law, whatever we have at our disposal, then I think there is a world in which we can stave off what I believe is an inevitable onslaught by Republicans.”
