“There’d been rumors of contract changes but being fired was a complete surprise.” Jay Caruso, a former RedState editor, now works for The Dallas Morning News but maintained a contract with the site until Friday morning. Related: Trump’s call to ‘Fox and Friends’ explains why we don’t hear much from him

RedState writers work on contract and are paid based on the amount of traffic to their posts. Jonathan Garthwaite, the vice president and general manager of Townhall Media, called him before he got to the meeting and fired him over the phone, Howe told me. “While these changes are painful, they were necessary once we reached the conclusion that we could no longer support the entire roster of writers and editors.”

RedState, a 13-year-old blog that was founded by Erick Erickson, is one of several sites in Townhall Media’s portfolio. Howe got the news while driving from his home in North Carolina to Washington to meet with Townhall Media, the arm of Salem Media which owns RedState, about Facebook strategy. A source with ties to RedState said bloggers had been “wondering if this was going to happen at RedState,” meaning “anyone who wasn’t a big fan of Trump would be dumped.”

RedState has been reflective of the divides within the GOP and the conservative movement, with a spectrum of writers with varying reactions to Trump’s political choices and personality conflicts. Though it’s not yet clear what will become of RedState, Caleb Howe said his impression is that management will not install a new editor to replace him, instead turning the site into a Twitchy-style network.
Conservative media site RedState fires most of its staff and its owner Salem Media Group freezes the site, stating they could "no longer support the entire roster of writers and editors". Staff claim they were fired for their opposition to U.S. President Donald Trump.