Chris Ruddy, CEO of the conservative Newsmax website and a longtime ally of President Trump, said former White House adviser Steve Bannon’s influence in national politics is greatly exaggerated by the media.
In an op-ed published Thursday at Newsmax, Ruddy said a new book quoting Bannon as attacking Trump and the president’s children reveals Bannon to be delusional and not as important as reporters portray him.
“For sure, the media loves to both beat up on Steve Bannon and inflate his influence,” wrote Ruddy. “In the past, they have called Bannon an anti-Semite and a racist. I have defended Bannon on both charges. He is neither. I believe Steve Bannon is a patriot, though misguided on many issues and dangerously zealous on others. Interestingly, his biggest fans are not conservatives like me but media liberals who have ballooned his influence.”
In the book “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,” journalist Michael Wolff quotes Bannon as referring to Trump’s son, Trump Jr., as “treasonous” for agreeing to meet with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign to obtain negative information on Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Bannon is also quoted as suggesting the president will be implicated in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s 2016 interference.
“This is all about money laundering,” Bannon is quoted as saying. “Mueller chose [senior prosecutor Andrew] Weissmann first and he is a money-laundering guy. Their path to fucking Trump goes right through Paul Manafort, Don Jr and Jared Kushner.”
The White House released a statement Wednesday with a counter-attack on Bannon, saying he wasn’t instrumental to the Trump campaign’s success and he held a minor role in the White House, before he left last August.
“The truth is Steve Bannon represents just a small fraction of the Republican party, folks who champion protectionism, isolationism and nativism,” Ruddy wrote in his op-ed. “If you believe the media spin, he also elected Donald Trump. But the truth is quite different: Trump elected Trump.”
