Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline spearheaded the effort. | Getty Democrats demand that Trump rescind Bannon appointment

Democrats on Tuesday began demanding President-elect Donald Trump rescind his controversial appointment of Breitbart News chief Steve Bannon.

A flood of Democrats in Congress fiercely rejected allowing Bannon to serve in the White House, arguing that Trump’s appointment of a man many have labeled a white supremacist already soils his six-day-old pledge to “be the president for all Americans.”


Bannon “in the White House is a major mistake,” Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy said. “Instead of bringing the country together, it condones intolerance, hate and disinformation.”

Less than a week into Trump’s White House transition, Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley has already called for a dramatic course correction, citing “a wave of verbal and physical assaults” against Americans in the wake of Trump’s election.

“We call on President-elect Trump to exclude the proponents of discrimination and hatred from the ranks of his administration, and that includes immediately firing Steve Bannon as his chief strategist,” said Merkley, who convened a news conference with two additional Senate Democrats and their soon-to-be colleague, Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, and later sent an email solicitation to supporters asking them to sign a petition.

“Quite frankly,” Hawaii Sen. Mazie Hirono said, “it’s sad that we are having a debate about whether a white supremacist should serve as a senior counselor to the president-elect.”

Trump tapped Bannon, the CEO of his presidential campaign and a former executive chairman of Breitbart, on Sunday as his chief strategist and senior counselor, a position the president-elect’s statement suggested was equal to and perhaps even more influential than his installation of Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus as his chief of staff.

New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, a rising star in the Democratic Party, predicted Trump’s presidency will be “disastrous” if he runs the federal government like he ran his campaign. In a Facebook post, Booker singled out Bannon as “a man who leads a website that promotes truly radical views about race and religion,” adding that neo-Nazis praised his selection.

Elevating such a man “to one of the highest positions in the White House installs a man with fringe and dangerous ideologies just steps from the Oval Office,” Booker warned. “Bannon won't build bridges, he will burn them. He is unfit to advise America's commander-in-chief. Donald Trump should reverse the decision to hire him and chart a different course for the good of the American people.”

Minnesota Sen. Al Franken described Breitbart as “a platform for racism, sexism, homophobia, and anti-Semitism,” he said in a Facebook post of his own in which he refers to Bannon as “a white nationalist who for years has stoked hatred.”

“White supremacists have made it clear that they see Bannon as their advocate in a Trump Administration, which is not only disturbing, but also dangerous for millions upon millions of people in Minnesota and across the country,” he wrote. “Steve Bannon should not be allowed to hold any position in the White House, let alone one that would allow him to make critical decisions about how our country is run. If he truly seeks to unite America, Donald Trump can start by finding someone else to advise him. And do it immediately.”

Congressional Democrats circulated a letter Tuesday morning asking Trump to pull his appointment of Bannon. It “validates the fears of people across the country over a sudden rise in bigotry & hate crimes,” Congressman Don Beyer (D-Va.) tweeted Tuesday morning, adding that he would be signing the letter.

Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline spearheaded the effort, sharing the missive with House Democrats. By 1 p.m., Cicilline’s office said the letter had 120 co-signers.

“Since the election there have been a number of incidents across the country in which minorities, including Muslim Americans, African Americans, and Jewish Americans, have been the targets of violence, harassment and intimidation,” the letter reads, according to a copy obtained by POLITICO. “Mr. Bannon’s appointment sends the wrong message to people who have engaged in those types of activities, indicating that they will not only be tolerated, but endorsed by your Administration. Millions of Americans have expressed fear and concern about how they will be treated by the Trump Administration and your appointment of Mr. Bannon only exacerbates and validates their concerns.”

While Trump’s transition team has tried to shield Bannon from the public eye — and Priebus and others have defended him — that hasn’t stopped Democrats from bludgeoning the embattled appointee amid calls to rescind his appointment.

Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said Bannon has “strategically” been absent from any interviews or public appearances but vouched for his character, promising “he’s not as scary” as he’s being portrayed.

“I know him well. I work hand-in-glove with him and I feel that these charges are very unfair,” she told NBC’s “Today.”

Republican Jewish Coalition board member Bernie Marcus backed Bannon in a statement released by RJC, expressing shock and sadness “to see the recent personal attacks on Steve.”

“The person that is being demonized in the media is not the person I know," he said. "These attacks are nothing more than an attempt to undermine the incoming Trump Administration.”

But Democrats aren't buying it. While Republicans have been reluctant to criticize Trump’s decision to tap Bannon — House Speaker Paul Ryan simply said of him, “This is a man who helped him win an incredible victory” — Democrats have unequivocally expressed their objection to granting him top access to the White House.

“I am appalled and disgusted that Donald Trump is doubling-down on hatred and racism in his very first action as President-elect,” New York Rep. Jerry Nadler said in a statement calling on Trump “to immediately retract his offer to Bannon” and warning that Americans “must not allow him to use the power of the White House as his new platform for spewing hate, racism, and white nationalism.”

“Instead of calling on the nation to end the violence, racism, and bigotry that is sweeping communities across the country, he has selected a known anti-Semitic, white nationalist, racist — Steve Bannon — to serve at the highest level of the executive branch,” he continued, adding that the president-elect should “pledge that no one who shares those anti-Semitic, racist values has any place in his administration.”

Congressman Rick Larsen (D-Wash.) tweeted Tuesday morning, “White nationalism, antisemitism, misogyny — views promoted by Steve Bannon (whose appt being cheered by KKK & neo-Nazis) — have no place in WH.”

And Wisconsin Rep. Mark Pocan shared a similar sentiment, remarking, “Donald Trump has already failed his first test as President-elect.”

“Bannon has a long track record of anti-Semitism and sexism and is revered by white nationalists and the KKK,” Pocan said in a statement. “He has built a career on spreading bigotry and hatred as the head of Breitbart News. Someone who stokes racism has no place in any Administration and Trump should immediately withdraw his appointment.”

Liberal firebrand Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a vocal Trump agitator, excoriated Bannon’s appointment and warned the real estate mogul — whose transition website boasts about his successful business empire — that “bigotry is bad for business.”

“He has brought Steve Bannon in as a senior strategist,” Warren said Tuesday morning at a Wall Street Journal event with CEOs. “This is a man who has white supremacist ties. I mean, that’s what he does. This is a man who told his ex-wife that he didn’t want his children going to school with Jews. This is a man who ran a news organization that ran headlines like, ‘Would you rather your children have feminism or cancer?’ This is a man who says by his very presence that this is a White House that will embrace bigotry.”