Facing questions over Charlottesville, Trump distanced himself from the controversial chief strategist and downplayed his role: ‘He came on very late’

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Donald Trump suggested on Tuesday that the days were numbered for Steve Bannon, the controversial White House chief strategist who has so far survived several rounds of staff upheaval and repeated calls for his removal.

The president refused to offer assurances about Bannon’s fate during an extraordinary press conference in which the president watered down his criticism of far-right protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, by suggesting that an “alt-left” was also to blame for deadly violence that erupted there over the weekend.

Asked if Bannon would remain in his position, Trump said: “We’ll see.”

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Trump also attempted to downplay Bannon’s influence on his presidential campaign, suggesting that he was already on a trajectory to the White House before the former Breitbart News editor joined the team.

“I like Mr Bannon. He’s a friend of mine. But Mr Bannon came on very late,” Trump said. “I went through 17 senators, governors and I won all the primaries. Mr Bannon came on very much later than that.”

Bannon, who has been styled “the Trump whisperer”, is largely credited as the mastermind behind the nationalist agenda that helped sweep the New York businessman to power. Before joining Trump’s campaign, Bannon turned Breitbart News, the far-right website he called a “platform for the alt-right”, into a megaphone for Trump.

Bannon’s tenure in the White House has been a rollercoaster. He was blamed for the botched rollout of the travel ban, which was re-introduced and remains in a legal tangle. He pitted himself and a coterie of like-minded advisors against staff members he doesn’t believe are populist enough, including the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Kushner and his wife, Ivanka Trump, Trump’s eldest daughter and adviser, have reportedly long urged Bannon’s dismissal.

Most recently, Bannon has reportedly turned his fire on HR McMaster, the national security adviser, waging a campaign against the general that is playing out through the media. Breitbart has led conservative media attacks on McMaster, accusing him of being hostile to Israel and questioning his loyalty to Trump.

Meanwhile, Republicans and conservatives have risen to the general’s defense.

“The recent attacks upon [McMaster] from the so-called ‘alt-right’ are disgraceful,” Senator John McCain, a Republican from Arizona, said in a sharp statement. “Since this fringe movement cannot attract the support of decent Americans, it resorts to impugning the character of a good man and outstanding soldier who has served honorably in uniform and sacrificed more for our country than any of his detractors ever have.”

On Sunday, McMaster refused three times to say if he could work with Bannon in the White House.

Some conservatives argue that Bannon is the lifeline to Trump’s political base and without his instincts the president could lose that energetic support. But the knives are out for him inside the White House. And outside, demands for his removal are intensifying.

After the weekend violence in Charlottesville, where one woman was killed when a white nationalist drove his car into a crowd, several Democrats drew a connection between Bannon’s position in the White House and Trump’s reluctance to explicitly condemn the white nationalist and neo-Nazi groups that marched in Virginia.

“If the president is sincere about rejecting white supremacists, he should remove all doubt by firing Steve Bannon and the other ‘alt-right’ white supremacist sympathizers in the White House,” House minority leader Nancy Pelosi said in a statement on Monday. She has previously called Bannon a “white nationalist”.

At a town hall in Lakewood, Colorado, Senator Cory Gardner, a Republican, was booed when he refused to say that Bannon should be fired.

But it’s not only Democrats. Conservative writer David Frech called Bannon an “alt-right apologist” in an op-ed calling on Trump to fire his chief strategist.

“How can Trump look the American people in the face and say that he unequivocally condemns the ‘alt-right’ when one of the men who did more than anyone else to enhance its influence works down the hall?” French wrote in the National Review.

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The New York Times reported on Monday that the conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch had urged the president to fire Bannon. Later that night, Anthony Scaramucci, who served briefly as White House communication director, accused Bannon of tolerating white nationalism.

“I don’t think he’s a white supremacist – although I’ve never asked him if he’s a white supremacist,” Scaramucci told Stephen Colbert on the Late Show. “What I don’t like though is the toleration of it.” He added that if it were up to him, Bannon would be “gone”.

Trump on Tuesday defended Bannon against those criticisms.

“I like him. He’s a good man. He is not a racist, I can tell you that,” Trump said. “He’s a good person he actually gets a very unfair press in that regard.”

But as far as whether Bannon’s job was safe – for now?

“We’ll see what happens with Mr Bannon,” Trump said.