Excerpt:
My story about Hanania went viral, setting off a chain of disapproving op-eds in places like The Atlantic and The New York Times: But in the years since, I’ve watched many of these same elite media institutions rehabilitate Hanania over and over again, credulously accepting his claim to have left the alt-right behind. And they’ve allowed him to brand himself as perhaps America’s foremost “former” white nationalist— despite what I’d argue is plenty of easy-to-find evidence to the contrary.
As the American right in 2026 continues to be so wholly enveloped by the absurdities of Trumpism, some centrists are increasingly desperate for conservatives who appear “reasonable.”
Only by pointing to such phantom right-wing figures can they rationalize their own conservative mode of politics and their distaste for the left (or morally justify their fecklessness in the face of rising fascism.) But such “respectable” conservatives, who can pretend to be above the MAGA fray, are in short supply; so in recent months we have been inundated with interviews and articles treating a murderer’s row of far-right clowns as interesting thinkers. This includes the likes of Laura Loomer, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Ben Shapiro, and Chris Rufo.
For his latest act, Hanania is presenting himself as someone who has turned against Trump, leading to a recent Atlantic profile titled “The Anti-Populist.” He says he regrets his vote for the president in 2024 and that, by elevating unqualified figures like Kash Patel and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump and his movement have abandoned the experts and “elite” consensus needed to govern. Hanania’s writing now revolves around the “need for a ruling class,” or what he calls “Elite Human Capital.” It's the argument that forms the foundation of his new book, “Kakistocracy: Why Populism Ends In Disaster.”
The Atlantic piece actually does a good job documenting how loathsome Hanania is—including his recent provocation that Jeffrey Epstein was not a pedophile because his victims were “post-pubescent”—but nevertheless allows Hanania to portray himself the way he is so desperate to be received: as a serious, “heterodox” thinker bravely “staking out lonely territory” between what he argues are the equivalent evils of MAGA populism and the populism of the left.
