Before Fox News and President Trump, there was Rush Limbaugh

On the right, Limbaugh will be sanctified as a hero, a master of shock radio and a tireless champion of conservative values.

Both sides are likely to agree on at least one thing: By turning conservative angst and anger into a national movement, Limbaugh helped lay the foundation for Fox News and then the presidency of Donald Trump.

In a sign of Limbaugh's influence, Trump called Fox News on Wednesday — the first time he had done so since leaving the White House — to praise the late radio show host. .

After four years in local radio in Sacramento, Limbaugh launched "The Rush Limbaugh Show" to national syndication in 1988.

Many of those attacks and conspiracies would be advanced by Trump, whom Limbaugh vehemently supported even as Trump's own celebrity among conservatives eclipsed that of the radio host himself

On Wednesday, his wife announced the news of his death to his listeners: "I, like you, very much wish Rush was behind this golden microphone right now," she said

Limbaugh's legacy lives on, however, in talk radio, in Fox News and its online imitators, and in the 74 million Americans who voted for Trump in 2020 and remain a potent and powerful force in American politics