The Bulwark (website)

The Bulwark
Type of site	News and opinion website
Available in	English
Owner	Defending Democracy Together Institute
Editor	Jonathan V. Last
URL	thebulwark.com
Launched	December 2018; 5 years ago
Current status	Online

The Bulwark is an American anti-Trump conservative news and opinion website launched in 2018 by Sarah Longwell, with the support of Bill Kristol and Charlie Sykes.^[1]^[2]^[3]^[4] It initially launched as a news aggregator, but it was revamped into a news and opinion site using key staffers from the recently closed The Weekly Standard.^[5]

History

Following the end of publication of The Weekly Standard in December 2018,^[6] editor-in-chief Charlie Sykes said: "the murder of the Standard made it urgently necessary to create a home for rational, principled, fact-based center-right voices who were not cowed by Trumpism."^[7] The site was created in December 2018 as a news aggregator as a project of the Defending Democracy Together Institute, a 501(c)(3) conservative advocacy group led in part by The Weekly Standard co-founder William Kristol.^[8] Several former editors and writers of The Weekly Standard soon joined the staff and within weeks of launch began publishing original news and opinion pieces.^[5] The website has frequently published pieces critical of Trump and of pro-Trump elites in politics and the media.^[1]

A podcast hosted by Sykes was launched on December 21, 2018.^[9] Longwell said that each of the podcast's January 2021 episodes were downloaded about 100,000 times.^[10] The publication's other podcasts include Shield of the Republic cohosted by Eric Edelman and Eliot Cohen, Beg to Differ hosted by Mona Charen, The Focus Group with Sarah Longwell, and The Bulwark Goes to Hollywood with Sonny Bunch, A French Village with Sarah Longwell and Benjamin Wittes, as well as The Secret Podcast, The Next Level, and Across the Movie Aisle, available only for paid subscribers.^[11]

As a non-profit project, The Bulwark does not run advertising, and is supported by donations.^[10] By January 2019, approximately $1 million had already been raised for the site, which was said to be adequate to keep the site running for one year.^[5] In 2021, The Bulwark launched Bulwark+, a program that provides paid subscribers with "exclusive podcasts, newsletters, and live-streams" for about $100 a year; within a few months, the website reported roughly 16,000 subscribers.^[10]

In 2021, Washingtonian magazine noted that content on The Bulwark is primarily geared toward readers seeking "serious coverage of events through a center-right filter" but that its editors have sought to attract centrist Democratic readers who may be "uncomfortable with the excesses of the progressive left."^[10]

Staff

The founder is Charlie Sykes, who also serves as editor-at-large along with William Kristol. With Sarah Longwell serving as publisher, the staff also include editors Jonathan V. Last, Adam Keiper, Jim Swift, Martyn Wendell Jones, Benjamin Parker, Sonny Bunch, and Mona Charen. Writers include Tim Miller Theodore R. Johnson, William Saletan, Cathy Young, and Amanda Carpenter.^[12] In the past year (2023-2024), Amanda Carpenter and Charlie Sykes have left The Bulwark (amicably) and AB Stoddard has joined it.

References

^ ^a ^b Coppins, McKay (February 22, 2019). "Naming and Shaming the Pro-Trump Elite". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on October 19, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2020. The Bulwark, the anti–Donald Trump conservative news site
^ Mike DeBonis; Jeremy Barr (February 28, 2021). "Rewriting January 6th: Republicans push false and misleading accounts of Capitol riot". Washington Post. Archived from the original on October 3, 2021. Retrieved March 23, 2021. the Bulwark, an anti-Trump conservative website
^ Darcy, Oliver (January 4, 2019). "Former Weekly Standard staffers find new home at The Bulwark". CNN. Archived from the original on November 10, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2020.
^ Morrison, Patt (October 9, 2019). "How Never Trumpers can get the GOP to stand up for constitutional conservatism again". Los Angeles Times (editorial). Archived from the original on March 4, 2020. Retrieved March 30, 2020.
^ ^a ^b ^c Darcy, Oliver (January 4, 2019). "Former Weekly Standard staffers find new home at The Bulwark, a conservative site unafraid to take on Trump". CNN Business. Archived from the original on January 7, 2019. Retrieved January 10, 2019.
^ Farhi, Paul (December 14, 2018). "The Weekly Standard, influential conservative magazine, will shutter". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on January 20, 2019. Retrieved January 16, 2019.
^ Rubin, Jennifer (January 8, 2019). "A bulwark against Trump and Trumpism". The Washington Post (editorial). Archived from the original on January 10, 2019. Retrieved January 16, 2019.
^ "Defending Democracy Together Institute (DDTI)". InfluenceWatch. Archived from the original on January 17, 2019. Retrieved January 16, 2019.
^ "The Bulwark Podcast". Defending Democracy Together Institute. Archived from the original on January 17, 2019. Retrieved January 16, 2019.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Andrew Beaujon, The Bulwark Was Founded to Oppose Trump. Now What? Archived August 29, 2021, at the Wayback Machine, The Washingtonian (March 3, 2021).
^ "Podcasts". The Bulwark. Archived from the original on November 7, 2021. Retrieved October 15, 2021.
^ "About Us". Archived from the original on May 31, 2022. Retrieved May 31, 2022.