Longtime Donald Trump ally Steve Bannon exploded at PBS reporter Mike Wiser during a Frontline interview, first recorded in April and published this week, when confronted over Trump's constant threats and insults against federal judges and asked whether this was "the type of thing a president should say."
The interview was released just as Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan spoke out on the issue during a gathering of judges in California.
In addition to criticizing her right-wing colleagues for a flood of unsigned, unexplained emergency orders canceling lower-court judges' blocks on Trump's effort to dismantle the administrative state, Kagan said of Trump's attacks, "Judges are fair game for all kinds of criticism, strong criticism, pointed criticism, but vilifying judges in that way is a step beyond and ought to be understood as such."
Bannon, enraged over criticism, lobbed an obscene tirade at Wiser.
“By the way, was there any complaint from PBS, or was there any complaint by the Democrats, on the rhetoric used against the judges when the Roe v. Wade decision came out, and they had to have police protection at their houses? I don’t remember anything about the rhetoric being too high," said Bannon. “You guys are so f------ phony on the face of it. This is why we’re defeating the left. The American people, as they see this, they go, ‘These guys are a bunch of f------ lying scumbags,’ which you are a bunch of f------ lying scumbags. You terrorize — you tried to terrorize Supreme Court justices over a decision that didn’t go your way.”
"They’re all gutless cowards," Bannon continued. "They’ve all hid behind the system for decades and decades and decades. So the university administrations? They’re not that tough. The big law firms? They’re not that tough. The media? Look who’s cratered. How many times — look at the settlement with Trump. They’re not tough."
By contrast, he said, with Trump supporters, “You can put us in f------ prison, you can take Trump up there and put him on trial every day, the people around Trump are battle-hardened, okay? You’re not gonna scare us and we’re not gonna stop, and what we know is you guys are a bunch of p------. You will crater. PBS is gonna crater. You know why? You’re not tough.”
The GOP has waged a crusade against public media in recent months, passing a Trump-proposed bill to claw back billions of dollars from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. NPR and PBS are primarily funded by viewer donations and sponsorships, but grants from the CPB are vital to maintaining the budgets of newsrooms in lower-income and more remote areas.
Watch the full interview here:
- YouTube www.youtube.com
