Former White House chief strategist Steven Bannon said in an interview that aired Sunday that President Trump Donald John TrumpSteele Dossier sub-source was subject of FBI counterintelligence probe Pelosi slams Trump executive order on pre-existing conditions: It 'isn't worth the paper it's signed on' Trump 'no longer angry' at Romney because of Supreme Court stance MORE is not a racist and blamed the "radical left" for divisions in the U.S.

He said in an interview with radio host John Catsimatidis on AM 970 in New York that people who do not support Trump's policies "realize that they can't defeat him on the policies so they're going to smear him as being a racist, a white supremacist, all of this stuff, and I don't think any of it holds water."

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"President Trump is not a racist, he's not a white supremacist, he's someone who has put a series of policies in that really have helped not just everybody, but have really helped the African American and Hispanic community," Bannon continued. "These divisions are being sown by the radical left."

Bannon's comments follow a mass shooting last weekend in which a man who killed 22 people is also accused of posting a manifesto online warning of a "Hispanic invasion."

The incident brought renewed scrutiny to Trump's rhetoric on immigration. Some presidential candidates including Sen. Elizabeth Warren Elizabeth WarrenHillicon Valley: Subpoenas for Facebook, Google and Twitter on the cards | Wray rebuffs mail-in voting conspiracies | Reps. raise mass surveillance concerns On The Money: Anxious Democrats push for vote on COVID-19 aid | Pelosi, Mnuchin ready to restart talks | Weekly jobless claims increase | Senate treads close to shutdown deadline Democratic senators ask inspector general to investigate IRS use of location tracking service MORE (D-Mass.) and former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) have called the president a white supremacist in the wake of the shooting.

Bannon and Trump had a public falling out in January 2018 after Bannon criticized the president and his family in Michael Wolff's book "Fire and Fury." Bannon has also served as a former editor of the far-right news outlet Breitbart.