Steve Bannon returns to Breitbart News after being pushed out of Trump team
The president’s former chief strategist returned as executive chairman to Breitbart News, which he led before joining the campaign.
Steve Bannon has returned to the conservative website Breitbart News after being pushed out of Donald Trump’s team following a turbulent seven months.
The blunt-spoken and divisive strategist, who rose from the Trump campaign to a top White House post, was pushed out by the president on Friday.
He has returned as executive chairman to Breitbart News, which he led before joining the campaign, and presided over its Friday evening editorial meeting, the news site said.
Several sources said Mr Bannon had been hinting for weeks that he might soon return to the helm of Breitbart News. At one point he casually discussed it as though it was a certainty, a source said.
Mr Bannon told Bloomberg politics he would continue to fight the same fights from outside the White House.
“If there’s any confusion out there, let me clear it up: I’m leaving the White House and going to war for Trump against his opponents – on Capitol Hill, in the media, and in corporate America,” he said.
Still, Bannon told allies he intended to hold the administration accountable if it falters on campaign promises.
Mr Bannon’s turbulent tenure was marked by the departure of much of Mr Trump’s original senior staff.
He pressed the president to enact some of his contentious campaign promises, including a travel ban and pulling out of the Paris climate change agreement.
Mr Trump has now forced out his hard-line national security adviser, his chief of staff, his press secretary and two communications directors. That’s on top of the FBI director he inherited from former president Barack Obama.
Mr Bannon’s departure is especially significant since he was viewed as Mr Trump’s connection to his most-committed voters and the protector of the disruptive, conservative agenda that propelled him to the White House.
“It’s a tough pill to swallow if Steve is gone because you have a Republican West Wing that’s filled with generals and Democrats,” former campaign strategist Sam Nunberg said. “It would feel like the twilight zone.”
