Andrew Breitbart | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Breitbart speaking atCPAC, 2012 | |
| Born | Andrew James Breitbart (1969-02-01)February 1, 1969 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Died | March 1, 2012(2012-03-01) (aged 43) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Resting place | Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery |
| Alma mater | Tulane University (BA) |
| Occupations |
|
| Years active | 1995–2012 |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 4 |
| Website | breitbart.com |
Andrew James Breitbart (/ˈbraɪtbɑːrt/; February 1, 1969 – March 1, 2012) was an Americanconservative journalist[1] and political commentator who was the founder ofBreitbart News and a co-founder ofHuffPost.
After helping in the early stages ofHuffPost[2] and theDrudge Report,[3] Breitbart createdBreitbart News, now afar-right[4] news and opinion website, which has been described asmisogynistic,xenophobic, andracist by academics and journalists, notably The University of California Press.[5]
Breitbart played central journalistic roles in theAnthony Weiner sexting scandal, thefiring of Shirley Sherrod, and theACORN 2009 undercover videos controversy.[6] Commenters such asNick Gillespie andConor Friedersdorf have credited Breitbart with changing how people wrote about politics by "show[ing] how the Internet could be used to route around information bottlenecks imposed by official spokesmen and legacy news outlets."[7][8]
Breitbart was born to Irish American parents in Los Angeles on February 1, 1969.[9][10] According to his birth certificate, his biological father was a folk singer. When he was three weeks old, he was adopted by Gerald and Arlene Breitbart, a restaurant owner and banker respectively, and grew up in the affluent neighborhood ofBrentwood.[9] His adoptive family wasJewish; his mother hadconverted to Judaism when marrying his father.[11][12] Breitbart studied atHebrew school and had aBar Mitzvah.[13][11]
Breitbart attendedBrentwood School, one of the country's top private schools, but did not distinguish himself, saying: "My sense of humor saved me".[11] However, he discovered that he loved writing, publishing his first comedic piece in the school newspaper, theBrentwood Eagle, analyzing the inequality in his high school's senior and junior parking lots: "One had Mercedes and BMWs, the other Sciroccos and GTIs".[11] Breitbart remembers his upbringing as apolitical, except in one instance: when the family's rabbi tried to defendJesse Jackson against charges of antisemitism after his "Hymietown" comment, his parents left the synagogue in protest.[11]
Joel Pollak wrote about how (Breitbart's) life and fire extended to Judaism: 'Andrew was proudly, and playfully, Jewish. In the last days of his life he wondered openly about observingShabbat, even as he continued to tease me about not eating bacon and shrimp cocktails. More than once he burst into a Hebrew school song or parts of hisbar mitzva portion while working at his desk across from mine – partly to amuse me and partly to entertain himself.'[14]
Breitbart would remain "proudly and playfully Jewish" throughout his life. The liberal-Left Jewish weekly,The Forward, placed him on their 2010 list of the top 50 most influential American Jews.[14] Joel Pollak wrote: "He carried his faith as he carried all his convictions: with a lighthearted touch but a deep commitment."[14] Breitbart later said of his profession: "I'm glad I've become a journalist because I'd like to fight on behalf of the Israeli people... And the Israeli people, I adore and I love."[14][15]
While in high school, Breitbart worked as apizza delivery driver; he sometimes delivered to celebrities such asJudge Reinhold.[16] He earned aBA inAmerican studies fromTulane University in 1991, graduating with "no sense of [his] future whatsoever."[17] His early jobs included a stint atcable channelE! Entertainment Television, working for the company'sonline magazine, and some time in film production.[12] He was a Lincoln Fellow at theClaremont Institute in 2009.[18][19]
Previously left-leaning in his politics, Breitbart changed his political views after experiencing "anepiphany" while watching the late 1991confirmation hearings for Supreme Court justiceClarence Thomas, due to what he considered unfounded attacks on the part of liberals based on former employeeAnita Hill's sexual harassment accusations.[20] Breitbart later described himself as "aReagan conservative" withlibertarian sympathies.[1]
Listening to radio hosts such asRush Limbaugh helped Breitbart refine his political and philosophical positions, igniting an interest in learning that he had suppressed as a result of his distaste for the "nihilistic musings of deadcritical theorists"[21] that had dominated his studies at Tulane. In this era, Breitbart also readCamille Paglia's bookSexual Personae (1990), a massive survey of Western art, literature and culture from ancient Egypt to the 20th century, which, he wrote, "made me realize how little I really had learned in college."[21]
Breitbart has been lauded for his role in the "evolution of pioneering websites" includingThe Huffington Post andThe Drudge Report, and later, forBreitbart News. Journalists such asNick Gillespie andConor Friedersdorf have credited Breitbart with bringing new voices to debates about politics and culture. Breitbart toldReason in 2004 that, after feeling ignored by existing outlets, "We decided to go out and create our media." Described as "a series of do-it-yourself demonstration projects" and "conversation pits", the Breitbart websites have been both criticized and praised for their role in various political issues.[8][22] Breitbart has been recognized for adopting an inclusive stance with regard to the participation of gay people in the conservative movement. He has also been credited with helping to derailconspiracy theories about Barack Obama's citizenship.[8]
In 1995, Breitbart sawThe Drudge Report and was so impressed that he e-mailedMatt Drudge. Breitbart said, "I thought what he was doing was by far the coolest thing on the Internet. And I still do."[2] Breitbart described himself as "Matt Drudge'sbitch"[23] and selected and posted links to other news wire sources. Later, Drudge introduced him to a then still-RepublicanArianna Huffington[12] and Breitbart subsequently assisted in the creation ofThe Huffington Post.[24]
Breitbart wrote a weekly column forThe Washington Times, which also appeared atReal Clear Politics. Breitbart also co-wrote the bookHollywood, Interrupted: Insanity Chic in Babylon withMark Ebner, a book that is highly critical of U.S.celebrity culture.[25] On January 19, 2011, theconservative gay rights groupGOProud announced Breitbart had joined its Advisory Council.[26]
In 2011, Grand Central Publishing released Breitbart's bookRighteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World,[27] in which he discussed his own political evolution and the part he took in the rise ofnew media, most notably at the Drudge Report andThe Huffington Post.[28][29]
Breitbart launched his first website as a news site; it is often linked to by theDrudge Report and other websites. It has wire stories from theAssociated Press,Reuters,Agence France-Presse,Fox News,PR Newswire, andU.S. Newswire, as well as direct links to a number of major international newspapers. Its political viewpoint as well as its audience runs to theright within the U.S. political spectrum.[30] In 2007, Breitbart launched a video blog, Breitbart.tv.[31]
In February 2011, Breitbart and one of his editorsLarry O'Connor were sued fordefamation byShirley Sherrod, who had beenfired after Breitbart posted a video of a speech given by Sherrod. The video had been selectively edited to suggest that she had purposely discriminated against a white farmer, while in reality the unedited video told the story of how she had helped that farmer.[32][33] Breitbart himself maintained that he stated this in his article about it, and that the purpose of the video was to show the crowd's positive reaction to Sherrod's statements about discriminating against the white farmer.[34] In July 2015, it was reported that Sherrod and Breitbart's estate had reached a tentative settlement.[33] It was reported October 1, 2016, that the lawsuit was settled.[35]
In June 2011, Breitbart's websites broke the story that congressmanAnthony Weiner wassending underage females revealing photographs of himself.[36]
In 2009, Breitbart appeared as a commentator onReal Time with Bill Maher andDennis Miller.[37] In 2004, he was a guest commentator onFox News Channel's morning show and frequently appeared as a guest panelist onFox News's late night program,Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld. Breitbart also appeared as a commentator in the 2004 documentaryMichael Moore Hates America.[38]
On October 22, 2009, Breitbart appeared on theC-SPAN programWashington Journal. He gave his opinions on the mainstream media, Hollywood, theObama administration and his personal political views, having heated debates with several callers.[1]
In the hours immediately following SenatorTed Kennedy's death, Breitbart called Kennedy a "villain", a "duplicitous bastard", a "prick"[39] and "a special pile of human excrement", adding, "Sorry, he destroyed lives. And he knew it," referring to Kennedy's actions during theChappaquiddick incident, theRobert Bork Supreme Court nomination, and theClarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination.[40][41]
In February 2010, Breitbart received theReed IrvineAccuracy in Media Award during theConservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. During his acceptance speech, he responded directly to accusations byThe New York Times reporter Kate Zernike thatJason Mattera, a young conservative activist, had been using "racial tones" in hisallusions to PresidentBarack Obama, and had spoken in a "Chris Rock voice". From the podium, Breitbart called Zernike "a despicable human being" for having made such allegations about what, according to him, was just Mattera's Brooklyn accent.[42] At the same conference, Breitbart was also filmed saying to journalistMax Blumenthal that he found him to be "a jerk" and "a despicable human being" over a blog entry in which Blumenthal accused Breitbart of employing a racist.[43] Blumenthal was referring toJames O'Keefe over his having attended aGeorgetown Law Center discussion on race featuring Kevin Martin,John Derbyshire, andJared Taylor, the last of whom foundedAmerican Renaissance, a white supremacist online magazine. Neither O'Keefe nor Breitbart endorsed Taylor's views.
In 2011, Breitbart said that "of course"Donald Trump was not a conservative, adding:
But this is a message to those candidates who are languishing at 2 percent and 3 percent within the Republican Party who are brand names in Washington, but the rest of the country don't know ... celebrity is everything in this country. And if these guys don't learn how to play the media the way that Barack Obama played the media last election cycle and the way that Donald Trump is playing the election cycle, we're going to probably get a celebrity candidate.[44]
These comments resurfaced after the controversy of Donald Trump hiringBreitbart News' executive chairmanSteve Bannon to be hisWhite House Chief Strategist.[44]
Breitbart often appeared as a speaker atTea Party movement events across the U.S. For example, Breitbart was a speaker at the first National Tea Party Convention at Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville on February 6, 2010.[45] Breitbart later involved himself in a controversy over allegations ofhomophobic andracial slurs being used at a March 20, 2010, rally at theUnited States Capitol in Washington, D.C., by asserting that slurs were never used, and that "it was a set-up" byNancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party. Breitbart offered to donate $100,000 to theUnited Negro College Fund "for any audio/video footage of theN-word being hurled," claiming that the several Congressmen made it up. Breitbart insisted CongressmanJohn Lewis and several other witnesses were forced to lie, concluding that "Nancy Pelosi did a great disservice to a great civil rights icon by thrusting him out there to perform this mischievous task. His reputation is now on the line as a result of her desperation to take down the Tea Party movement."[46][47]
In February 2012, a YouTube video showed Breitbart yelling atOccupy D.C. protesters outside a Washington hotel hosting aConservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). The video showed security escorting Breitbart back to the hotel while he told the protesters to "behave yourself", and alluding to reported assaults of women at Occupy encampments, he repeatedly yelled, "Stop raping people", and called the protestors "filthy, filthy, raping, murdering freaks!" David Carr said with the incident Breitbart had caused his last "viral storm on the Web."[48][49]
Breitbart appeared posthumously inOccupy Unmasked, a documentary film bySteve Bannon that contends that theOccupy Wall Street movement of "largely naïve students and legitimately concerned citizens looking for answers" is actually orchestrated by sinister, violent, and organized leaders with the purpose of not just changing, but destroying the American government.[50]
The Breitbart Doctrine is the idea that "politics is downstream from culture" and that to change politics one must first change culture.
Christopher Wylie, a former employee ofCambridge Analytica stated in an interview withThe Guardian:
The reason why he [Steve Bannon] was interested in this is because he believes in this idea of the 'Breitbart Doctrine', which is that if you want to change politics you first have to change culture because politics flows from culture. If you want to change culture, you have to first understand what the units of culture are, and the people are the units of culture. So, if you want to change politics, you first have to change people to change culture.
— Chris Wylie, 2018[51]
Breitbart considered this idea an important one and often spoke of it in interview or cited it in print.
Breitbart described himself as "eighty-five per cent conservative and fifteen per cent libertarian".[52] Breitbart had previously described himself as a Democrat but shifted towards being conservative after witnessing the Democrats' treatment ofClarence Thomas during his senate confirmation hearing.[53][54]
Breitbart supported legalization ofprostitution,[55]gay rights, anddrug liberalization.[56] He was an opponent ofmulticulturalism andpolitical correctness.[57] Breitbart argued for US military intervention inSyria,North Korea,Iran, andChina for humanitarian reasons. He was also a supporter ofIsrael.[58]
Breitbart was a proponent of theCultural Marxism conspiracy theory, claiming there are academics attempting to undermine western culture.[57]
Breitbart was married to Susannah Bean, the daughter of actorOrson Bean and fashion designer Carolyn Maxwell, and had four children.[2][59][60]
At around 11:30 p.m.PST on February 29, 2012, Breitbart collapsed on a street near his home inBrentwood. He was rushed toRonald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 12:19 a.m. on March 1, 2012.[61][62][63] He was 43 years old.
Anautopsy by theLos Angeles County Coroner's Office showed that he hadhypertrophic cardiomyopathy with focal coronaryatherosclerosis and died from congestive heart failure, which had been diagnosed the year before.[62][64]
Rick Santorum,Reince Priebus,Mitt Romney,Jonah Goldberg,Joel Pollak,Sarah Palin,Matt Drudge,Sean Hannity,Michael Steele,Tucker Carlson,Glenn Beck,Rush Limbaugh, andNewt Gingrich paid tribute to Breitbart.[65][66][67][68] Santorum called Breitbart's death "a huge loss" that strongly affected him.[65][69] Romney praised Breitbart as a "fearless conservative", while Gingrich remembered him as "the most innovative pioneer in conservative activist social media in America".[65]
A special episode ofRed Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld aired the day after Breitbart's death as the host and panelists paid their tributes and showed clips from his appearances on the show.[70]
In contrast, Gab users who shared more right-wing "fake news" websites are relatively more visible on Gab. Some of the most cited sources under this category include the Unhived Mind (N = 2,729), Epoch Times (N = 1,303), Natural News (N = 1,301), Breitbart (N = 769), the Gateway Pundit (N = 422), and InfoWars (N = 656).
Breitbart relied on fear-inspiring racist and xenophobic narratives that had salience with whites who were reacting to the economic anxiety over the Great Recession with racial resentment over the election of the first self-identified black president and the increase in the proportion of the US population made up of racial minorities. [...] The election of President Barack Obama saw Breitbart continue the long-standing American practice of spreading racist-laden fake news stories. For example, Breitbart stories claimed that Obama was born in Kenya and supported terrorist organizations. Breitbart's fake news stories were not only racist but xenophobic and Islamophobic
But an analysis ofBreitbart's content demonstrates the venue's commitment to normalizing neofascistic ideology, even as it refuses to acknowledge what it is doing. AsRolling Stone identified when it ran a November 2016 profile piece,Breitbart has a troubling history of promoting misogyny, Islamophobia, homophobia, and racism. [...] Concerning black-white relations in the United states,Breitbart also has an eliminationist-style rhetoric that depicts protests of racial inequality and police brutality as a fundamental threat to the nation.
Third, writers atNational Review took a moral high ground and accusedBreitbart and Donald Trump of enthusing extremist groups associated with the alt-right, which the publication claimed were known for their misogyny, sexism, racism, and xenophobia. [...] By callingBreitbart "the homepage for peckerwood-trash racists and the white-power basement dwellers,"National Review accused the far-right media outlet of paving the way for white supremacists to enter the mainstream.
A key toBreitbart's success has long been the fake news modules, misinformation and propagandized narratives that form the content core of theBreitbart News website.Breitbart has carefully honed an anti-immigration, anti-Muslim online presence in a media universe complete with stories that raise fears of "white genocide".
By March 2017, they have collectively purchased less than 0.5 percent of Breitbart's inventory. These agencies have listedBreitbart to their list of brand-unsafe websites because the far-right site violated their hate speech policies (Benes, 2017). [...] In the case ofBreitbart, brands such as Kellogg's withdrew ads because they didn't want to be associated with a media outlet that produces racist and xenophobic content.
Critics, including some conservatives formerly associated with it, have denounced Breitbart in its current incarnation as a hate site steeped in misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, white nationalism and anti-Semitism.
Media from Commons
Quotations from Wikiquote
Data from Wikidata| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
