Transcripts For CSPAN2 Washington Journal Michael Kirk Discu

CSPAN2 Washington Journal Michael Kirk Discusses Bannons War May 23, 2017

A focus on steve bannon. Why is that . Guest we just finishedoad tt making a film called trumps road to the white house in january. We talked to Kellyanne Conway and everybody around us the moment of the present selection and we wanted bannon and one of our producers said the texan said we would like you to come back we are shooting a trump tower and bannon wrote basically you dont want me. All you guys want to do is make me darth vader. That was after the media saying theres got to be more to this guy than he is selfaware. I wanted to know everything i can about him and i spent the last months going and behind the this sort of fireworks around the Trump Administration and the chaos and disruption which i always felt with a little bit of the dodge. I went down inside to what we are still looking forward to this shakespearean struggle going on in and around the oval office and thats where we reside in our broadcast tonight. Host when it comes to steve bannon whats the perception that you talk about and what have you found out by looking at him specifically . One person told me that bannon is the message and trump is the messenger. Its not quite as clearcut as that. Obviously trump has a wellknown perspective. The people inside the films they trump was spectacularly good at the gut instinct and a been reading breitbart, the web site that bannon was the executive editor of in washington out of a place called the Breitbart Embassy over by the supreme court. It was bannon who everybody said managed to take trumps gut instinct and turned them into what was known as bannonism which is an ideology that made a coherent post trump was saying about America First about the ai muslims and the muslim ban as they talked about all the time and islamic terrorists. All of those kinds of phrasess and all of that has a sort ofent coherence that leads back to the immigration battle that happened elecapitol hill in 2013 and 2014 in the 2012 election. Bannonism, the sort of coherent structure you saw around trump in those of august through november when he won the presidency. Host you can see that on cbs. Michael kirk joining us. If you want to ask questionsgs about things hes learned while the king at steve gannon. 202 7488001 for republicans and independents by 202 7488002. Your reference to bit from a the documentary tonight about how the executive chairman of end breitbart ended up coming into contact with donald trump and we will show it to you. His influence was growing a now banned and renewed hisl search for a political warrior who could transform the country bannon is someone who has been looking for a figurehead to attach himself to it for a very long time. In new york city there was a breitbart reader who was just the person bannon was looking for. Trump was reading and digesting breitbart views as long ago as 2013, 2014 and internalizing these things. C nobody cared about donald trump and politics in 2014. Bannon had been introduced to trump by david rossi ahead of the conservative Advocacy Group citizens united. Bossy and bannon our friendsi bannon said come over and meet donald trump is thinking of running for president so they all meet up at the trump towert in new york and they talk about it. I had known steve bannon for 10 years work done a lot of. Projects. Hes one of the greatest strategic mind that i have ever been around. Trump continues to keep the relationship going with bannon from that point on. In trump bannon had found a fighter who matched his own instincts. Breitbart, palin trump are antiestablishment figures and o think that appeals to them and its more about destroying enemies and thats where he and trump me. They are very much. Host mr. Kirk to that last point about destroying enemies talk about that and the fact that you spoke with someone formerly of breitbart and david bossi as well. Guest the thing when trump and bannon got together that first time in almost every time after that there was a common quality that they shared in the sort of real fighter instinct. You saw that manifest after the firing of comey in the pushback that was happening when trump went to the Coast Guard Academy last weekend and gave the commencement address insteadfi fight, fight, fight. Im going to go for it. That is pure bannonism 100 . I think thats really the thing they have in common trump says he recognized the wealthy guy i who was kind of like him. I think theres an awful lot about the two of them that is very much the same including that instincts to go after people, hit them when they are down. Winners and losers in trump got it from his father back when he was a little boy. His father kept saying in the dichotomy of the world there are winners and losers in the donald r. Winner. Thats very much also the steve bannon back story. Thats how the two of them really got to know each other and enjoy each other and even to this day when bannon under the craftsman in some way, bannon is there representing the base. A lot of the people we haveart p talked the breitbart people ande others say bannon identified early first and sarah palin and then through breitbart or the readers comments from breitbart who dat who that base was in trump was also identified as a nativist orientation and America First idea that hadnt really been seen by the republican establishment. Y bannon that sort of explains why bannon and breitbart when after the republican establishment through the immigration battle adding on Jeff Sessions the senator from alabama that had collaborated with them. Steven miller sessionsd communications director. The three of them in the breitbart staff really took down or participated seriously and importantly in the taking down of harry cancer and the other members of the republican establishment including john boehner. They were kind of painkillers in that sense and thats what brought the attention of trump and that relationship is what brought rum to the white house. Host the term ill write mark altright tends to be affiliated with breitbart. Guest a lot of people say he couldnt be the editorinchief of breitbart without eating a racist or in antisemi. We have talked to an awful lot of people about it. Heres the consistent approach and there are people of course say you couldnt run that web site with sections like black crime and illegal alien crime and engenders the kind of comments you could read atly breitbart with a misogynist and xenophobic quote. Talke others we talked to said wait a minute the guy personally said they have never seen him or heard him say anything say anything racist or xenophobic at what they say is it is true that running that site creates certain complications. Others say no matter who you are if you are a prominent and he is one of the top three really out there fringe republican conservatives, you were going to naturally get to pick what thosn descriptions by the liberal left and the elite media. In a way its a question thats not answered in our film. Its a question that i leave to the viewer and the American People to decide based on the information thats available to them. Host michael kirk is our guest and you can see that special tonight on pbs bannons war on the frontline program. Our first call for you is from cal in new york on the democrats line. You are on with michael kirk. Go ahead. Caller good morning mr. Kirk. I have been a big fan of your filmmaking on pbs for years and years and also a special shout out to will lineman who was also a narrator for pbs going back to the 50s. He is irish reassuring voice as you are. I wanted to your subject at all greens discussion about the Trump Administration and how all your films going back to your analysis of the Bush Administration and the iraq war. I always look forward to your documentaries this in terms of some kind of revelation someone behindthescenes action of the administration. I guess many viewers see them, journalism as a door to damagina evidence that wouldnt necessarily lead to impeachment but just a condemnation or a revelation. Host what are you looking for for our guest as far as a statement or comment . What you want to have them respond to . Caller i just wondered how his motives as a filmmaker coincide with the native viewers to watch this film to get that kind of inside information that may justify their negative views of the administration or any improprieties or illegalities that they may have conducted. Guest i think we have probably made 11 films about the bush of administration in the iraq war and torture issues and things like that. We made eight films about the Obama Administration. Equally i think touching a raw nerve here and there and here we are now in the second, hurd found. We made a film called the choicd where we put in the biography of Hillary Clinton and donald trumi last september. This is the first of what will probably be nine or 10 or 12 films in 48 years depending on how long the Trump Administration last. We are here for serious longform journalism to take the high road to the 30,000foot view not above the fray of politics but to get down in there and say how do these dots connect . You think you know a lot about whats been happening with trump. Its been in the headlines every day. Last week a shocking revelation. We think it will help you understand some of the motivation and some of the shakespearean war going on behind all of those headlines and all of those groups. In im not really in the scoop business but im in the connecting scoops business they get to see a real trend and that trend is establishing itself in a way that i hope our viewers over the years now as they have with the clinton first of administration and the bush ofon administration and then the Obama Administration witnessed a slightly different view than it did from the nightly news. Host from Pennsylvania Democratic line fred, go ahead. Thanks for taking my call. I have watched your films and im a fan of frontline. Could you give me some of your opinion on what might have been the feud between bannon and do you have any idea . I do have a pretty good sense of that. During the campaign they were real allies because jared and ivanka understood that they had then was the guy who pulled itwh all together and rationalize trumps policies. He kept them on the straight and clinow tim off twitter in those less important days when they were breaching Hillary Clintons wall. I think by the time they got to the white house band and philosophy created chaos and destruction and that works very well to get trump elected. They promised they would create chaos and disruption all over washington. They would drain the swamp and i think when it seemed to be working kushner was with him and ivanka was with him at that time. Bannon is a little like the kamikaze or the che guevara to fidel castro. Those guys dont last very long once you assume the problems of governing so everybody wondered bannon himself how long bannon could win and last with this. Disruption and chaos. Nt it lasted about a month and what stopped him was at least made him go underground a little bit andys trying to come back now with the idea that you went to cpac the conservative Political Action groups annual meeting and he stepped up and the jrue the light to himself. He was then on the cover of Time Magazine called the great manipulator. Saturday night live made skits about him being the real president of the United States and it didnt take long forr of jared to draw the attention ofhi the president s prospects fatherinlaw to the idea thata bannon who admits to all the other collapses around the travel ban and other things that steve bannon was giving a littli big for his britches and it didnt take long for trump who we all know is all about the spotlight is on me. We talked to people who save with its failure to trump is looking for someone to blame and trump wants to be the one that receives all the credit in the oval office. Its not a surprise that happened that when it happened to bannon. Host we did seem a cpac in february tech about the media perceptions of the donald trump and what they did wrong about it. What do you have to say in response . Corporate globalist media that are adamantly opposed, adamantly opposed to an economic nationalist agenda like donald trump has the President Trump laid this out many years ago for cpac and cpac originally gave him the springboard. The first time in right part we started seeing him and saw how people resonated with people and they would go out to the smaller town halls later and keep that traction with the same message he is bringing. Heres where it gets worse because he is going to continue to prep his agenda and his Economic Conditions get better as more jobs get better. They will continue to fight. C if you think they will give you your country back without a fight you are sadly mistaken. Ayv [applause] every day its going to be a f fight and that is what im proudest of donald trump. Its all the opportunity had to waiver. E all the people of come in and said hes a moderate. I committed to does to the American People are promised when iran im going to deliver on this. Bann host there is mr. Bannons defense. I think what you see there is a perfect example of who bannon is to donald trump. P. Bannon is the base. Bannon represents the base. Jared kushner and ivanka and the wall street people that are around and the billionaires who are around President Trump represent a more moderate perspective of a more wall street establishment spectrum. Bannon continues to be the representative of the face and his job as he sees it is to create the kind of chaos and disruption that the base selected donald trump to go in there and do to drain the swamp. As the perfect articulation of the modus operandi and thee reason i think steve bannon is still around donald trumpe despite what looks like a at times especially now a sort of more moderate stance. The fact is whenever the rubber meets the road and whenever theg going gets tough and the controversy starts to build it seems like donald trump reverts back to what steve bannon tells him when he is in the oval office which is fight, fight, fight. They are not going to give your country. Theyre not going to give you this government the way you wanted to be mr. President. You are going to have to go get it and you will have to go to china in order to do that. Bannon has in his office whiteboards on which he has written the promise is trump made during the campaign and how they are doing on them and they think the reminder of that over and over to the president of the United States is what tanden sees as his role and its how we perceive what hes supposed to bedoing. His elbows are getting sharper and sharper in the many factions and Reince Priebus and mike pence faction. Solve a swirling seething donald trump has surrounded him with and bannon right now is probably laying a little zero but he will be back again with those elbows in the theory of fight, fight,h fight. Thats exactly what you saw in that clip. Host terry on the independent line. Caller good morning to everyone. I just wanted to say as soon as the Transition Team and i think that was mostly guided by pence and ryan was formed to bannon lost right there because this is truly a globalist agenda nothing that trump had ran on and it looks like if anybody wants to drain the swamp why would you put that swamp monsters, the godzillas in charge . With these competing factions who is going to win and in who is going to lose . The American People are going to lose. To my vote for trump is certainly mistaken we need to rectify it. I dont know how we are going to do this but we have got to do this. If you just take a look, i was watching Congress Last week overturning time and a half for workers. Theres a lot of vulnerable gullible workers who are taken advantage of and its things like this. E to me it looks like big oil, the military and the industrialve complex. Guest ive been watching the president since jimmy carter in every administration has thit fight. What most administrations do not have is the super Friends Group of people in some unlike steve e bannon inside the government. There are people who get him elected but to stay inside the government and be vital and said the government the west wing is extremely rare thing. Bannon brought with him three or four people. Jeff sessions the attorney a general for all the key ones and thats usually my view of the white house. There are people in that oval office who were the former radicals, the outsiders and the french people who are now in the west wing. Its interesting to watch and see how long they can last and how long they can withstand the forces that have come on every sitting president to get more to the center to get more into the globalist perspective that the world is operating under and has been for a number of years. It is bannons existence inside their bed from what i can tell the days to satisfy the least trump is listing some of the time in that span is one hope of winning whatever winning is to him inside this particular administration. He will take a populist president and keep him in that place that he was then when he was running and right after he was elected. He will appear backandforth but especially domestically this is where bannon says im the base and i represent the base. If you dont want me out of your site because otherwise that side of it, that radicalio revolutionary provocateur approach to government that drained the swamp will never bes satisfied if i am gone and ii think trump hears that. Its clear that he acts on it whenever he is in a bind and its also true from what we can tell from the poll numbers and a few numbers and others that a very High Percentage of thep trump true believers are still with him. I think an awful lot of that can be contributed bannons push and demand that trump ip what will happen after this trip . He will happen when they get back here . Are will happen when the independent counsel or whatever he is called now, special kouns counsel begins to really investigate and that starts to

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