Podcasting gives Utah politicians a new platform for political discourse

SALT LAKE CITY — As smartphones and other digital devices have become all but ubiquitous across the United States, new ways of gathering information have begun to change Americans’ preferences for getting news.

Social media sites like Facebook, X and TikTok have emerged as popular news platforms for many Americans, just as interest in radio and print newspapers has declined. Podcasts have also been a growing factor in the political media landscape, offering candidates and pundits a chance to engage with audiences without the limitations of a news broadcast on network television or radio.

While only about 6% of U.S. adults prefer podcasts as their news source, per a Pew Research Center poll in September, that’s up from 3% five years earlier, and it comes as more politicians are using podcasts to boost their platforms.

President Donald Trump made waves when he appeared on Joe Rogan’s hugely popular podcast as a candidate ahead of the presidential election last year. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, rumored to be a Democratic presidential candidate in 2028, launched a podcast of his own earlier this year, where he has interviewed guests across the political spectrum, including Trump-aligned figures such as Steve Bannon and the late Charlie Kirk.

But it’s not just national figures who are getting in on the podcasting game. Some Utah politicians are using the medium to reach a more niche audience of interested politicos around the Beehive State.

‘Political as Heck’

State Sen. Todd Weiler, R-Woods Cross, is well known in political circles as one of the more outspoken lawmakers on Capitol Hill, who isn’t shy about sharing his opinion on social media or with reporters. In 2019, he launched his own podcast, “ToddCastUtah” — no connection to “The Chuck ToddCast,” launched by former NBC and MSNBC political director Chuck Todd earlier this year.

Weiler used the podcast to interview fellow lawmakers and discuss legislative issues, but between his lawmaking duties, campaigning and his day job as an attorney, he began to feel “burned out” and finally took an unofficial hiatus from his role as podcast host.

“I enjoyed the interviews, but I didn’t enjoy all the production work, paying the monthly fees for the accounts and everything like that,” the senator told KSL.

Then came Corey Astill, a Utah native who was moving back to the state after working in Washington, D.C. Weiler said Astill approached him, asking for recommendations about who to start a political podcast with, and Weiler jumped at the idea.

“I said, ‘Well, if you’re willing to do all the stuff I don’t like and I can just show up and pontificate, I’d be happy to do it with you,'” he said.

So was born “Political as Heck,” what Weiler described as a “tongue-in-cheek” nod to the state’s culture.

The podcast isn’t coming close to the millions of listeners who tune in to Rogan — it has only 27 ratings on Apple Podcasts — and Weiler said he would be surprised if it ever turned into something more than a hobby, but it is an inside look at the machinations of the Utah Legislature for those interested and involved in Utah politics.

“We’re not setting the world on fire, but I’m surprised at how many people listen to it,” he said. “I think a lot of young staffers for our congressional offices in Utah — they live in D.C. — and I think it’s easy for them to become a little bit disconnected. So if our podcast kind of helps keep them connected to what’s happening in Utah as opposed to what’s just happened in D.C., I think that’s wonderful.”

Podcasts and artificial intelligence

Weiler isn’t the only member of the Utah Senate who hosts a regular podcast. Sen. John Johnson, R-North Ogden, hosts the “PoliticIt” podcast and runs its associated website, which features summaries of podcast discussions generated largely by artificial intelligence and republishes news articles from a local nonprofit outlet.

The project began before Johnson joined the Senate in 2021, and is a meeting of his interests in politics and technology. He gives his guests — who are a mix of candidates, politicians and other public figures — a platform for conversations while showing off the latest advances in artificial intelligence.

In addition to generating lengthy AI articles about each interview, Johnson feeds the conversations into an AI model, which then creates a unique song about each guest. He has uploaded more than 100 such songs inspired by interviews with Rep. Celeste Maloy, Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

“It’s more for the person that comes on the podcast, because they actually, I think, get a kick out of listening to it,” Johnson said. “And then they share it with other people and then other people will go watch the podcast and so it’s kind of a way to build the audience. But it’s also a way of showing people how powerful this technology is.”

Johnson also has aims to create full podcasts using only AI-voices debating political issues and thinks AI will eventually play a much larger role in curating the content on his site and others.

What makes podcasts special?

Even Johnson admits, however, that an AI podcast is more experimental than anything and that listeners are drawn to podcasts because they feel more authentic than other kinds of mass communication.

“I think there’s a desire to connect. So much of what we do is disconnected,” he said. “We’re still human, right? And we like to feel human emotion. We like to understand how someone grew up and how they formed their ideas of the world. And I think those are important.”

Johnson isn’t a journalist, and he sees his role as host as giving people a platform where they can share their views without being fact-checked or being pressed with difficult questions. He rarely pushes back on his guests, and typically only does so if they veer into spreading the “vitriol” of personal politics, he says he’s trying to keep out of his conversations.

Johnson said he often has a fuller picture of guests after interviewing them, and hopes to present them in a way that his audience feels the same. He said Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson often gets pushback from some conservatives online, but was pleasantly surprised by her when she came on his show.

“I think that anybody who watched that saw her as a person, and that was the goal,” he said. “I hate the way social media has denigrated conversations that we have. I just think there’s a lot of fascinating people. … It gave me a different feeling for who she was.”

Weiler and Astill of “Political as Heck” are both Republicans, but they represent two different streams of conservative ideology. While they often agree on issues, Weiler thinks their differences in approach — and occasionally, in substance — make for a better product.

“Corey is a little bit more conservative than I am, which is fine, and despite that, we agree most of the time on most of the issues,” he said. “I think it’s more entertaining when we don’t agree, but we don’t fake it. If we agree, we agree. If we don’t agree, we don’t agree.”

Weiler thinks authenticity serves politicians and their constituents well and said politicians shouldn’t try to win elections by being someone they’re not. The same principle applies to new forms of media, he said, where they give public figures a chance to be themselves.

“If they’re only thinking, ‘Gosh, what could I tweet or say today to get the most reactions or get the most new followers … or whatever,’ I think they’re wrong,” he said.