Priebus defends Steve Bannon as 'force for good' on campaign

Far from the white-supremacist, misogynistic portrayal he’s received in the media, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said Monday that incoming White House chief strategist Steve Bannon is actually “very wise and smart” and “was a force for good on this campaign.”

“I like to judge people as I see it as opposed to seeing what other people say and I think most people that are watching know that that's the way to live your life,” Priebus said on Fox News’s “Fox and Friends.” “I'll tell you the Steve Bannon I know is a guy that is really on the same page with a lot of the things — almost everything that I agree with as far as advising president-elect Trump.”


Bannon, who took a leave from his job as an executive at the alt-right media outlet Breitbart to join Trump’s campaign, was reported to be under consideration to be the incoming president’s chief of staff, a job that ultimately was given to Priebus. Which of the two men the Manhattan billionaire ultimately picked was widely seen as an indicator of what type of tone his White House would adopt: Priebus’s more measured approach or the combative one favored by Bannon.

And while Bannon was ultimately passed over for chief of staff, his role as chief strategist has done little to allay concerns about his influence inside the West Wing. Priebus was asked Monday morning if the ideology of Breitbart, which has published stories headlined “There’s no hiring bias against women in tech, they just suck at interviews,” “birth control makes women unattractive and crazy” and “Bill Kristol: Republican spoiler, renegade Jew,” will arrive at the White House with Bannon.

“The guy I know is a guy that isn’t any of those things,” Priebus said on NBC’s “Today” in defense of the White House’s incoming chief strategist, noting that Bannon’s byline had not appeared on any of the controversial articles even though he was overseeing the website at the time. “The guy I know is a guy sitting in an office all day yesterday, talking about hiring and in the last few months, this is a guy who has exhibited none of those qualities. Here’s a guy who’s Harvard Business School, he was a 10-year naval officer, London School of Economics, I believe. He is a guy who is very, very smart, very temperate.”