#WARROOM LISTEN LIVE FULL#

He’s done the best job of articulating what Trumpism is, which includes sweeping in the Big Lie as one of its foundational ideas, but also a kind of economic populism, an economic nationalism.Īnd I think he’s a dangerous force in American politics, in that he is the number one roaring outboard motor of disinformation in the United States right now. What he also is is the guy who has given intellectual texture and firmness to a Trump philosophy, because there never really was an articulated Trump philosophy. He came in in 2016 and took a floundering campaign at the 11th hour and he made the campaign viable. Steve Bannon was, if you were going to assign responsibility to anyone, I would say the most responsible for getting Trump elected. Let’s start with a basic question: Who is Steve Bannon really? Jennifer Senior

#WARROOM LISTEN LIVE FULL#

As always, there’s much more in the full podcast, so listen and follow Vox Conversations on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Senior is a Pulitzer-Prize winning staff writer at the Atlantic and the author of a recent feature on Bannon and his influence called “ American Rasputin.” She was given plenty of access to Bannon and his associates - so much so that, in the piece itself, she wonders: Am I being used?īelow is an excerpt of our conversation, edited for length and clarity. That’s why I invited Jennifer Senior onto a recent episode of Vox Conversations to discuss Bannon. Bannon speaks, and a ton of people listen - which is why Bannon has become a person of interest for the January 6 committee, and why I believe we can’t fully understand this political moment without also understanding what he’s been up to. He has been one of the most effective propagandists for Trump and the lie that the 2020 election was stolen. Every day, from the basement of a Washington, DC, townhouse referred to as “the Breitbart Embassy,” he broadcasts his thoughts, live and unedited, for four hours a day. Since 2019, he’s been hosting a podcast called War Room, and it is hugely influential. He then served in the White House as chief strategist but lasted only seven months in that role. He went from running the conservative propaganda website Breitbart News to becoming the CEO of the first Trump campaign in August 2016.

Just this week, he set off push alerts when he announced that he would be willing to testify in front of the January 6 House committee - a proceeding that he has relentlessly hammered for weeks.Ī few years ago, Steve Bannon was the subject of plenty of media fascination. If you had to rank the people most responsible for the Trumpist turn in American politics, Steve Bannon would land pretty high on that list.īannon hasn’t been in a position of formal power since the summer of 2017, when he stepped down as Trump’s chief strategist (or was fired - it depends who you ask), but he still lurks in the shadows of President Joe Biden’s Washington.

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