Early years Matthews was born in
New Jersey in 1966, and grew up in
Florida. He attended
North Carolina State University in
Raleigh, North Carolina and studied
political science. but he didn't finish his undergraduate studies, he would joke, as he “was doing too much broadcasting.” "It's a heritage station with a great team, and it's what I enjoy doing." Jeff Hurley, Regional Program Manager at Clear Channel Media and Entertainment Harrisburg, considers Matthews "the perfect host to drive political discussion in Central Pennsylvania. He brings energy and excitement that’s infectious to everyone around him." Matthews radio career "comeback" was profiled by local TV station '69 News' WFMZ in early 2019. He appeared as a guest on Tucker Carlson's FoxNews TV program just prior to the general election in 2020, where they discussed numerous extremist right-wing conspiracies, such as
Pizzagate and
replacement theory. Matthews was presented with a commemorative Russian flag, which he considered, "one of the greatest honors of my life". Matthews considers
Glenn Beck, whose "approach to marketing, business, and media" he admires, a major influence. His show was intended to be “a place where you can come to openly examine what is really going on in our country. We have everyday conversations about pop culture, people, and politics, without censorship and trendy wokeness." WHP 580 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania was the flagship affiliate of
The Ken Matthews Show and aired the program on delay, 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. ET. Matthews gave a preview of his syndication focus in a video interview with Radio Ink. In Feb. 2022, a radio news website published an article tracking the growth of the syndicated program. FoxNews published coverage of Ken Matthews' commentary from his radio show on April 19, 2022. On July 16, 2022, Matthews posted that he had been terminated by his network syndicator, after "profane" comments he was exchanging with his production engineer ended up live on-air. By way of explanation (and apology), Matthews said: Matthews had been reading “some of
Hunter Biden's texts about his mother and other family members in what I thought was a secure communication between my engineer and myself during what I presumed was a commercial break." In a follow-up post he alluded that he may begin performing a program via the social media video platform
Rumble. On July 26, 2022 Matthews said, "I am un-syndicated which means I am not on regular radio anymore, so this is the first time officially in four decades that I haven’t been broadcasting." ==Stations==