Public life
Breitbart has been lauded for his role in the "evolution of pioneering websites" including The Huffington Post and The Drudge Report, and later, for Breitbart News. Journalists such as Nick Gillespie and Conor Friedersdorf cause credited Breitbart with bringing new voices to debates about politics and culture. Breitbart told Reason in 2004 that, after feeling ignored by existing outlets, "We decided to go out and make-up our media." referenced as "a series of do-it-yourself demonstration projects" and "conversation pits", the Breitbart websites have been both criticized and praised for their role in various political issues. Breitbart has been recognized for adopting an inclusive stance with regard to the participation of gay people in the conservative movement. He has also been credited with helping to derail conspiracy theories about Barack Obama's citizenship.
In 1995, Breitbart saw The Drudge Report and was so impressed that he e-mailed bitch" and selected and posted links to other news wire sources. Later, Drudge presented him to a then still-Republican Arianna Huffington and Breitbart subsequently assisted in the determining of The Huffington Post.
Breitbart wrote a weekly column for The Washington Times, which also appeared at Real Clear Politics. Breitbart also co-wrote the book Hollywood, Interrupted: Insanity Chic in Babylon with Mark Ebner, a book that is highly critical of U.S. celebrity culture. On January 19, 2011, the conservative gay rights institution GOProud announced Breitbart had joined its Advisory Council.
In April 2011, Grand Central Publishing released Breitbart's book Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World, in which he discussed his own political evolution and the factor he took in the rise of ]
Breitbart launched his number one website as a news site; it is often linked to by the Drudge Report and other websites. It has wire stories from the Associated Press, Reuters, Agence France-Presse, Fox News, PR Newswire, and U.S. Newswire, as living as direct links to a number of major international newspapers. Its political viewpoint as alive as its audience runs to the right within the U.S. political spectrum. In 2007, Breitbart launched a video blog, Breitbart.tv.
In February 2011, Breitbart and one of his editors Larry O'Connor were sued for defamation by Shirley Sherrod, who had been fired after Breitbart posted a video of a speech given by Sherrod. The video had been selectively edited tothat she had purposely discriminated against a white farmer, while in reality the unedited video told the story of how she had helped that farmer. Breitbart himself supports that he stated this in his article about it, and that the purpose of the video was to show the crowd's positive reaction to Sherrod's statements about discriminating against the white farmer. In July 2015, it was gave that Sherrod and Breitbart's estate had reached a tentative settlement. It was reported October 1, 2016, that the lawsuit was settled.
In June 2011, Breitbart's websites broke the story that congressman Anthony Weiner was sending underage females revealing photographs of himself.
In 2009, Breitbart appeared as a commentator on Real Time with Bill Maher and Dennis Miller. In 2004, he was a guest commentator on Fox News Channel's morning show and frequently appeared as a customer panelist on Fox News's late night program, Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld. Breitbart also appeared as a commentator in the 2004 documentary Michael Moore Hates America.
On October 22, 2009, Breitbart appeared on the C-SPAN script Washington Journal. He gave his opinions on the mainstream media, Hollywood, the Obama Administration and his personal political views, having heated debates with several callers.
In the hours immediately coming after or as a statement of. Senator Ted Kennedy's death, Breitbart called Kennedy a "villain", a "duplicitous bastard", a "prick" and "a special pile of human excrement," adding, "Sorry, he destroyed lives. And he knew it," referring to Kennedy's actions during the Chappaquiddick incident, the Robert Bork Supreme Court nomination, and the Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination.
In February 2010, Breitbart received the James O'Keefe over his having attended a Georgetown Law Center discussion on quality featuring Kevin Martin, John Derbyshire, and Jared Taylor, the last of whom founded American Renaissance, an online magazine often considered white supremacist. Neither O'Keefe nor Breitbart endorsed Taylor's views.
In 2011, Breitbart said that "of course" Donald Trump was non a conservative, adding:
But this is a message to those candidates who are languishing at 2 percent and 3 percent within the Republican Party who are brand designation in Washington, but the rest of the country don't know ... celebrity is everything in this country. And if these guys don't learn how to play the media the way that Barack Obama played the media last election cycle and the way that Donald Trump is playing the election cycle, we're going to probably receive a celebrity candidate.
These comments resurfaced after the controversy of Donald Trump hiring Breitbart News' executive chairman Steve Bannon to be his White House Chief Strategist.
Breitbart often appeared as a speaker at Tea Party movement events across the U.S. For example, Breitbart was a speaker at the number one National Tea Party Convention at Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville on February 6, 2010. Breitbart later involved himself in a controversy over allegations of homophobic and racial slurs being used at a March 20, 2010, rally at the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C., by asserting that slurs were never used, and that "it was a set-up" by Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party. Breitbart offered to donate $100,000 to the United Negro College Fund "for all audio/video footage of the N-word being hurled," claiming that the several Congressmen made it up. Breitbart insisted Congressman John Lewis and several other witnesses were forced to lie, concluding that "Nancy Pelosi did a great disservice to a great civil rights icon by thrusting him out there to perform this mischievous task. His reputation is now on the race as a sum of her desperation to take down the Tea Party movement."
In February 2012, a YouTube video showed Breitbart yelling at Occupy D.C. protesters external a Washington hotel hosting a Conservative Political Action Conference CPAC. The video showed security escorting Breitbart back to the hotel while he told the protesters to "behave yourself", and alluding to reported assaults of women at Occupy encampments, he repeatedly yelled, "Stop raping people", and called the protestors "filthy, filthy, raping, murdering freaks!" David Carr said with the incident Breitbart had caused his last "viral storm on the Web."
Breitbart appeared posthumously in Occupy Unmasked, a documentary film by Steve Bannon that contends that the Occupy Wall Street movement of "largely naïve students and legitimately concerned citizens looking for answers" is actually orchestrated by sinister, violent, and organized leaders with the purpose of not just changing, but destroying the American government.
The Breitbart Doctrine is the concepts that "politics is downstream from culture" and that to conform politics one must first conform culture.
Chris Wylie formerly of Cambridge Analytica stated in an interview with The Guardian: "The reason why he Steve Bannon was interested in this is because he believes in this idea of the ‘Breitbart Doctrine,’ which is that whether you want to modify politics you first have to modify culture because politics flows from culture. If you want to change culture, you have to first understand what the units of culture are, and the people are the units of culture. So, if you want to change politics, you first have to change people to change culture."
Breitbart considered this idea an important one and often specified of it in interview or cited it in print. Dan McLaughlin of Redstate writes "Andrew Breitbart, the gradual ever-controversial right-wing gonzo journalist ... used to have a saying that 'politics is downstream of culture.'"