《TAIPEI TIMES》 Trump fires White House strategist Steve Bannon

/ AP, WASHINGTON

Steve Bannon, the divisive strategist who rose from US President Donald Trump’s conservative campaign to a top White House post, was on Friday pushed out by the US president, capping a turbulent seven months marked by the departure of much of Trump’s original senior staff.

A favorite in the further-right portions of the Republican Party, Bannon had pressed Trump to follow through on some of his most contentious campaign promises, including his travel ban for some foreigners and his decision to pull out of the Paris climate change agreement.

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He returned as executive chairman to Breitbart News, which he led before joining Trump’s campaign, and presided at its Friday evening editorial meeting, the news site announced.

Trump has forced out his hard-line national security adviser, his chief of staff, his press secretary and two communications directors — in addition to the FBI director he inherited from former US president Barack Obama.

Bannon’s departure is significant since he was viewed by many as Trump’s connection to his base of most-committed voters and the protector of the disruptive, conservative agenda that propelled the celebrity businessman to the White House.

“It’s a tough pill to swallow if Steve is gone because you have a Republican West Wing that’s filled with generals and Democrats,” former campaign strategist Sam Nunberg said shortly before the news of Bannon’s departure broke. “It would feel like the twilight zone.”

There was a dramatic, one-word warning from Breitbart.

“#WAR,” tweeted Joel Pollak, a senior editor-at-large at the news site.

Indeed, Bannon’s nationalistic, outsider conservatism served as a guiding force for Trump’s rise to office.

He injected a dark populism into the campaign and sharpened its attacks on former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, encouraging Trump’s instinct to fight and counterpunch at every turn.

When the release of a 2005 tape, in which Trump can be heard boasting about groping women, threatened to capsize the Republican’s campaign, Bannon attempted to turn the tables by gathering a group of women who had accused former US president Bill Clinton of sexual assault and trying to ambush the Democratic nominee at a general election debate.

Without him, Trump’s agenda is left in the hands of more moderate advisers, including his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, his oldest daughter, Ivanka, and his economic adviser, whom Bannon has slammed as “globalist.”

However, Bannon was also accused by many of his critics of leaking to reporters in a bid for self-promotion and egging on Trump’s most damaging impulses.

Trump spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Bannon and chief of staff John Kelly, only recently installed himself, had agreed that Friday would be Bannon’s last day.

“We are grateful for his service and wish him the best,” she said in the only statement from the White House.

A combative and unorthodox Republican, Bannon was a contentious presence in a White House divided by warring staff loyalties.

新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES