Freaked-out Steve Bannon urges Trump to roll back big Democratic election wins
Steve Bannon is freaking out about Tuesday's election results that handed Democrats big wins – especially in a pair of key races.
Democrats significantly outperformed their election margins from last year and racked up wins in gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey, but Bannon told Politico that President Donald Trump must take immediate action to undo Zohran Mamdani's win in the New York mayor's race and the results of the Proposition 50 redistricting measure in California.
"Two things I would do," Bannon told Politico. "Number one, get [Assistant Attorney General] Harmeet Dhillon and the Justice Department to go out and file suit against this scam of [California Gov. Gavin] Newsom on this redistricting plan that went against the constitution of California. I would get the Justice Department to file suit, go get a [temporary restraining order] immediately, and then hit this thing and drag it out for a year."
"Number two, I would get DHS, the State Department and the Justice Department looking immediately at Mamdani, who I am convinced did not get citizenship in a fair and honest way, and get those two things rolling," Bannon added.
He urged the president to listen to Mamdani's post-election speech in which he directly challenged the president, who has threatened to withhold federal support for New York City if Andrew Cuomo did not win, and Trump responded with a cryptic post on Truth Social.
"There should be even more than alarm bells," Bannon said. "There should be flashing red lights all over."
Bannon expressed fear that Mamdani would inspire imitators in other cities and "squeeze" business interests with "Marxist" policies.
"You’re going to see a whole new group of Mamdanis in these major urban cities because they’re just flooded with immigrants, right?" Bannon said. "That’s where his vote came from, principally, and the progressive left, these kids have come up through the public school system. This is the flower of what the progressive left has delivered over the last 40 or 50 years. You saw it tonight and people, we’re going to have a fight on our hands."
"His speech tonight could not have been nastier or more aggressive," he added. "He mocked Cuomo. That is one of the first families of the Democratic Party, particularly in the state of New York."
Bannon believes Republicans must embrace Trump and the MAGA movement even tighter to avoid even worse losses in next year's midterms.
"You’re either with MAGA or you’re not," he said. "The Republican Party has no following. It has a bunch of donors, and it has the Fox TV network, and it has Karl Rove and all these worn-out ideas you see in the House and the Senate. It’s just embarrassing. The Republican Party is just a husk. When Trump is engaged, when Trump’s on the ballot, when Trump’s team can get out there and get low-propensity voters — because that’s the difference now in modern politics — when they can do it, they win. When he doesn’t do it, they don’t."
"You double and triple down with Trump," Bannon added. "If you’re not prepared to do that, you’re going to get smoked, because you’re not going to see Trump voters come out, like in Virginia, just like in New Jersey."