Rush Limbaugh
Rush Hudson Limbaugh III was an American conservative political commentator who was the host of The Rush Limbaugh Show, which first aired in 1984 and was nationally syndicated on AM and FM radio stations from 1988 until his death in 2021.
Limbaugh became one of the most prominent conservative voices in the United States during the 1990s and hosted a national television show from 1992 to 1996. He was among the most highly paid figures in American radio history; in 2018 Forbes listed his earnings at $84.5 million. In December 2019, Talkers Magazine estimated that Limbaugh's show attracted a cumulative weekly audience of 15.5 million listeners to become the most-listened-to radio show in the United States. Limbaugh also wrote seven books; his first two, The Way Things Ought to Be and See, I Told You So, made The New York Times Best Seller list.
Limbaugh garnered controversy from his statements on race, LGBT matters, feminism, sexual consent, and climate change. In 1993, he was inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame and in 1998 the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame. During the 2020 State of the Union Address, President Donald Trump awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Early life
Limbaugh was born on January 12, 1951, in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, to parents Rush Hudson Limbaugh II and Mildred Carolyn Limbaugh. He and his younger brother David were born into the prominent political Limbaugh family; his father was a lawyer and a United States fighter pilot who served in the China Burma India Theater of World War II. His mother was from Searcy, Arkansas. The name "Rush" was originally chosen for his grandfather to honor the maiden name of a family member, Edna Rush.Limbaugh was partly of German ancestry. The family includes many lawyers, including his grandfather, father and brother; his uncle, Stephen N. Limbaugh Sr., was a federal judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. His cousin, Stephen N. Limbaugh Jr., is a judge in the same court, appointed by George W. Bush. Limbaugh's grandfather, Rush Limbaugh Sr., was a Missouri prosecutor, judge, special commissioner, member of the Missouri House of Representatives in the 1930s, and longtime president of the Missouri Historical Society.
In 1969, Limbaugh graduated from Cape Girardeau Central High School, where he played football and was a Boys State delegate. At age 16, he worked his first radio job at KGMO, a local radio station. He used the airname Rusty Sharpe having found "Sharpe" in a telephone book. Limbaugh later cited Chicago DJ Larry Lujack as a major influence on him, saying Lujack was "the only person I ever copied." In deference to his parents' desire that he attend college, he enrolled at Southeast Missouri State University but dropped out after two semesters. According to his mother, "he flunked everything he just didn't seem interested in anything except radio." Biographer Zev Chafets asserts that Limbaugh's life was in large part dedicated to gaining his father's respect.
Career
1971–1988: Early radio career
In February 1971, after dropping out of college, the 20-year-old Limbaugh accepted an offer to DJ at WIXZ, a Top 40 station in McKeesport, Pennsylvania. He adopted the airname "Bachelor Jeff" Christie and worked afternoons before moving to morning drive. The station's general manager compared Limbaugh's style at this time to "early Imus". In 1973, after eighteen months at WIXZ, Limbaugh was fired from the station due to "personality conflict" with the program director. He then started a nighttime position at KQV in Pittsburgh, succeeding Jim Quinn. In late 1974, Limbaugh was dismissed after new management put pressure on the program director to fire him. Limbaugh recalled the general manager telling him that he would never land success as an air personality and suggested a career in radio sales. After rejecting his only offer at the time, a position in Neenah, Wisconsin, Limbaugh returned to living with his parents in Cape Girardeau. During his time in Pittsburgh, he became a lifelong fan of the Steelers NFL team.In 1975, Limbaugh began an afternoon show at the Top 40 station KUDL in Kansas City, Missouri. He soon became the host of a public affairs talk program that aired on weekend mornings which allowed him to develop his style and present more controversial ideas. In 1977, he was let go from the station but remained in Kansas City to start an evening show at KFIX. The stint was short-lived, however, and disagreements with management led to his dismissal weeks later. By this time, Limbaugh had become disillusioned with radio and felt pressure to pursue a different career. He looked back on himself as "a moderate failure as a deejay". In 1979, he accepted a part-time role in group sales for the Kansas City Royals baseball team which developed into a full-time position as director of group sales and special events. He worked from the Royals Stadium. There he developed a friendship with then-Royals star third baseman and future Hall of Famer George Brett. The two men remained close friends. Limbaugh said that business trips to Europe and Asia during this time developed his conservative views as he considered countries in those geographic areas to have lower standards of living than the United States.
In November 1983, Limbaugh returned to radio at KMBZ in Kansas City for a year. He decided to drop his on-air moniker and broadcast under his real name. He was fired from the station, but weeks later he landed a spot on KFBK in Sacramento, California, replacing Morton Downey Jr. The show launched on October 14, 1984. Limbaugh began to express his political opinions in 1985 when he mocked the Great Peace March for Global Nuclear Disarmament, which he considered along with the general anti-war movement to be "inherently anti-US, yet was reported as substantive and morally correct by a willing and sympathetic media". The FCC's repeal of the fairness doctrine—which had required that stations provide free air time for responses to any controversial opinions that were broadcast—on August 5, 1987, meant stations could broadcast editorial commentary without having to present opposing views. Daniel Henninger wrote, in a Wall Street Journal editorial, "Ronald Reagan tore down this wall in 1987 ... and Rush Limbaugh was the first man to proclaim himself liberated from the East Germany of liberal media domination."
1988–1990s: WABC New York City, syndication, and tie brand
In 1988, former ABC Radio Network executive Ed McLaughlin offered Limbaugh the nationally syndicated 12pm–2pm slot at ABC Radio Network to replace Owen Spann. Since many local radio stations of the time were hesitant to carry nationally syndicated programming during the daytime, he also secured Limbaugh a separate 10am–12pm show at WABC-AM in New York City to satisfy the provision of his contract requiring employment in a Top 5 market to leave KMBZ.Limbaugh began his new show at WABC-AM on July 4, 1988, with the first episode focusing on the Iran Air Flight 655 shootdown the previous day. His national program debuted on 50 stations the next month on August 1, and by three months later had expanded to 100 stations. He debuted just weeks after the Democratic National Convention, and just weeks before the Republican National Convention. Limbaugh's radio home in New York City was the talk-formatted WABC, and this remained his flagship station for many years, even after Limbaugh moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, from where he broadcast his show. Limbaugh's show moved on January 1, 2014, to WABC's cross-town rival WOR, its final New York outlet.
By 1990, Limbaugh had been on his Rush to Excellence Tour, a series of personal appearances in cities nationwide, for two years. For the 45 shows he completed that year alone, he was estimated to have made around $360,000.
In December 1990, journalist Lewis Grossberger wrote in The New York Times Magazine that Limbaugh had "more listeners than any other talk show host" and described Limbaugh's style as "bouncing between earnest lecturer and political vaudevillian". Limbaugh's rising profile coincided with the Gulf War, coupled with a stalwart support for the war effort and relentless ridicule of peace activists. The program was moved to stations with larger audiences, eventually being broadcast on over 650 radio stations nationwide.
By the 1992 United States presidential election, Limbaugh had established himself as an influential political commentator. During the Republican Party presidential primaries, Limbaugh expressed a preference for Pat Buchanan over the incumbent George H. W. Bush, which Buchanan himself attributed to his early success in the primaries. Bush's campaign subsequently worked to court Limbaugh, culminating with an invitation to stay overnight at the White House's Lincoln Bedroom. Limbaugh was also given a seat at the president's box in the Houston Astrodome during the 1992 Republican National Convention, and both President Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle appeared on Limbaugh's program.
In November 1992, Democrat Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States. Limbaugh satirized the policies of Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton, as well as those of the Democratic Party in general. Following the Republican Revolution, in which the party regained control of Congress in the 1994 midterm elections after several decades, the freshman Republican class awarded Limbaugh an honorary membership in their caucus, crediting him with having had a role in their success.
In 1995, Limbaugh started selling a line of neckties under the brand No Boundaries Collection, designed by his then-wife Marta without themes, ties to politics, or ties to issues. Limbaugh complained about coverage of the line, which he said underrated the ties' radicalness, and said media descriptions were emblematic of their general inaccuracy. Sold in nearly 1,500 retail outlets by 1996, the brand sold more than $5,000,000 worth in the first year. The New York Times described the designs: "Much like their promulgator, Mr. Limbaugh's four dozen or so styles seem designed to evoke maximum sensory outrage. Like Rainbow Black, whose interweaving rainbow strands and blue raindrops play around an Ionic column, atop which a cranberry-red pomegranate tree sprouts from an urn. Or Triangle Red, with colliding stacks of black-and-yellow triangles and disjointed horizontal black stripes on a background of speckled salmon." In 2000, Limbaugh rented the email list collected from the No Boundaries website to Rudy Giuliani's senate campaign. The business dissolved along with his marriage to Marta but in 2020 the ties were still being sold by TieGal, Inc., for $29 each.