The Guy Who Connected Donald Trump to the Manosphere

During Donald Trump’s first term, John Shahidi, then a manager of DJs and pop artists such as Anitta, had a problem. He noticed that when he mentioned his admiration for the president in meetings, people would get quiet. Invitations to certain parties dried up; one night, after he said he was staying at the Trump Hotel in New York, his dinner companions, who were planning to meet with him again the next day, canceled. He worried that his clients were losing out on opportunities by associating with him and that he was also losing clients. “Nobody said, ‘Hey you’re a Trump supporter, I’m leaving you,’” he says. “They just left.”

Yet even as the rejection stung, personally and professionally, he saw an opportunity. Where was the entertainment for people like him? When the Covid-19 pandemic happened, he and his brother, Sam, left the music industry behind and started the Shots Podcast Network, a collection of creators they could pair with advertisers. It was focused on YouTube, where the algorithm was rewarding edgy conservative thought and where video podcasts were taking off, especially among men. The Shahidis—Sam usually running operations and product, John in charge of marketing, celebrity relationships and partnerships—were always willing to shake things up to chase the next opportunity. In the early mobile app boom, they designed apps on behalf of athletes and fighters such as Mike Tyson and Floyd Mayweather Jr.; in 2013 they built a failed selfie-sharing social network called Shots, which pop star Justin Bieber backed. Then they were early to digital media. Even in the music industry, they’d worked with YouTubers-turned-artists including Lele Pons. Podcasts were their best guess at a big celebrity growth market.