“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for awhile,” Steve Bannon said. | Getty Trump aide Bannon calls media the 'opposition party'

Steve Bannon, President Donald Trump’s chief White House strategist, railed against the media in an interview, calling them the "opposition party" and advising the press corps to "keep its mouth shut."

Bannon, formerly an executive at Breitbart, a conservative, alt-right news outlet , said in an interview with The New York Times on Wednesday evening that the media had been “humiliated” by Trump’s election.


“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for awhile,” Bannon said. “The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”

He criticized The New York Times and The Washington Post by name in the interview, and said the mainstream media have “no power” as a result of the election.

“The mainstream media has not fired or terminated anyone associated with following our campaign,” Bannon said. “Look at the Twitter feeds of those people: they were outright activists of the Clinton campaign.”