Steve Bannon’s Playing It Different This Time Around

President Donald Trump has returned to the White House and Steve Bannon is back in the nation’s capital, plotting his next move. The chief strategist during the early months of Trump’s first term, Bannon returns to Trump’s extended orbit from a stint in jail tanned, rested and ready to wield his substantial influence in support of the MAGA agenda.

Although not formally working together, the president and his former strategist are both engaged in bolstering a broader coalition and expanding Trump’s influence this time around.

“All the power players from the first term are on the outside,” Bannon, 71, told Newsweek in an interview this week on the sidelines of the inauguration.

The outside may be where Bannon feels most comfortable. His time in the White House ended abruptly after about seven months, when then-Chief of Staff John Kelly sent him packing. Following his departure, Trump distanced himself from Bannon, saying: “When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind.”

That’s all water under the bridge now. Speaking from his Capitol Hill row house just behind the Supreme Court, the self-described free speech absolutist — known for championing America First policies, shaping Trump’s 2016 campaign messaging, and promoting far-right nationalist ideologies — told Newsweek he is leveraging his media influence in support of the administration, despite not being officially affiliated.

Bannon has spent the past few years working behind the scenes to bolster support for Trump’s comeback and doubling down on his America First platform. Every week, he produces nearly two dozen hours of content for his War Room podcast, drawing a devoted following even as the show has been banned from most mainstream social media and streaming platforms for allegedly spreading misinformation, inciting violence and other platform policy violations.

At home in his sitting room, decorated with a large blue area rug embroidered with patriotic stars, Bannon repeatedly claimed victory in his political and personal feuds with figures like Nancy Pelosi and Elon Musk.

Bannon completed his four-month federal prison sentence just days ahead of the November 2024 election. He was sent to jail for defying a subpoena from a congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, which Pelosi appointed Representatives Bennie Thompson as the chair and Liz Cheney as a ranking member.

“Pelosi put me in prison for a misdemeanor for four months. I’m more empowered now than I’ve ever been. She’s been kicked out of the Democratic Party. And Liz Cheney and Bennie Thompson are in the White House, they’re begging for a pardon,” he said. “I won.”

Biden preemptively pardoned both Thompson and Cheney hours before Trump took office and after this interview was conducted.

Bannon, a longtime critic of China and Musk’s business dealings with Beijing, has become more vocal in challenging the billionaire tech titan who, arguably, is playing an unofficial role in the second Trump term similar to the official one Bannon played during the first.

But Bannon also understands that money talks. Musk spent at least $250 million backing “our strategy,” Bannon said, calling it “MAGA Base Plus” or an effort to expand Trump’s support rather than just activate the old base.

Because of that financial support, Bannon said Musk “deserves a seat at the table.”

“ I’m glad that the table’s over in the EOB [the Eisenhower Executive Office Building across the street from the White House] and not in the West Wing. It’s not in the Cabinet Room… you might as well be in Siberia.”

When asked about the daylight between Bannon, who describes himself as a “populist nationalist” and Trump’s second term approach of embracing the tech giants and billionaires who Bannon calls “oligarchs,” the War Room podcaster reaffirmed his support for Trump’s desired to “build a broader coalition.”

These “techno-feudalists” and “tech bros” are welcome in Trump’s larger coalition,  Bannon said, but “President Trump’s core is populist nationals based upon ‘America First’ and American citizens first.”

“Here is a brutal reality nobody wants to talk about. And they never talked about it. The tech oligarchs are all progressive Democrats. They’ve just surrendered to Trump,” he added.

“They’re not calling the shots. They’re sitting there like trophies mounted on a wall,” Bannon said in reference to the row of tech CEOs and venture capitalists seated behind Trump — and, notably, in front of his Cabinet picks — during the inauguration.

Bannon noted that Trump’s “troops are battle-hardened” from what they believe to be a “stolen” 2020 election. There remains no evidence of widespread voter fraud in that election, which former President Joe Biden won.

Some of these “battle-hardened” members include former White House staffers. “President Trump needs support from the outside. He needs podcasts. He needs information that’s not Fox [News],” Bannon said, identifying a role that he is helping to fill.

He noted that former top advisers, including Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, Corey Lewandowski, Kellyanne Conway, Sean Spicer, Reince Priebus, and himself, are “all  dedicated to make him win in different verticals. And that’s why this time is going to be very different.”

“Our mission, everybody that’s on the outside, is to support Trump, to support the Trump program, and just hit as hard as we can,” he said of the “self-organized” coalition.

In a follow-up text message about what is different this time around, Bannon reaffirmed that it’s about capturing attention: “I have a massive media platform and everyday we push the Trump agenda hard.”