The CEO of the Young Turks, Cenk Uygur, praises the political news strategy

Cenk Uygur won’t give news consumers what they want.

As election season comes to a close, the controversial political commentator and CEO/founder of The Young Turks is so committed to being brutally honest with his views that he openly admits he’s willing to lose viewers rather than do what he sees his mainstream rivals doing: toe party lines on both sides of the aisle.

“Because what they want to hear is not necessarily true,” Uygur said in the final episode of the series Variety podcast “Strictly business.” “So a news industry has emerged that is filled to the brim with people, whether it’s mainstream media or social media, they’re all giving the public what they want.”

Listen to the podcast here:

But the 22-year-old digital news brand, also known as TYT, refuses to pander to its progressive-minded audience.

“Nobody actually gets the truth, and we try to give them the truth, and that alienates people, and it’s a dangerous strategy that we have to actually deliver the news,” said Uygur, who briefly challenged Joe Biden for the election 2024. presidential nomination before abandoning his bid. “We’re doing something completely different now than almost everyone else online, and it’s so new it’s almost old-fashioned, and it’s costing us our audience.”

That said, TYT has built a sizable audience in its 22 years of existence, dating back to the very first wave of original programming to grace YouTube. Alphabet’s site is still its main home base, but TYT has amassed about 27 million subscribers on platforms ranging from TikTok to FAST channels.

Elsewhere in the podcast, Uygur outlines the future of news media and TYT’s role in it, highlighting the importance of dynamic ad insertion on YouTube. He also discusses the importance of calling out both right-wing and left-wing media for their inaccuracies and biases, and not being influenced by politicians or advertisers.

As for how he sees the upcoming election, Uygur shares his predictions about Kamala Harris’ campaign and the challenges she faced, including her decision to be friendlier to corporate America.

‘Strictly business’, yes Variety‘s weekly podcast featuring conversations with industry leaders about media and entertainment. A new episode debuts every Wednesday and is available for download on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher and SoundCloud.