WASHINGTON (Guardian) — Donald Trump has not ruled out asking former White House strategist Steve Bannon to help run his 2020 presidential campaign, according to a new book about the Trump administration.
Bannon has recently been in Europe, seeking to boost populism across the continent. But judging by The Best People: Trump’s Cabinet and the Siege on Washington, a book by Alexander Nazaryan of Yahoo News which was published this week, he could soon be on his way back to Washington. The Guardian obtained a copy.
Like Michael Wolff’s pair of books about the Trump campaign and White House, The Best People is heavily reliant on interviews with Bannon, demonstrating the former adviser’s continued influence in crafting public perceptions of Trump and Trumpism.
Last year, Bannon was banished from circles close to Trump after, among other things, he called the president’s eldest daughter “dumb as a brick” and his eldest son “treasonous” in Wolff’s first book, Fire and Fury.
But Nazaryan reveals that just in time for what looks to be a desperate re-election fight, and notwithstanding Bannon’s controversial comments to Wolff for his new book, Siege, Bannon appears to have returned to Trump’s good graces.
In an interview with Trump carried out in February 2019, Nazaryan asks the president if he would rehire Bannon, a former Breitbart News executive who has extolled the political usefulness of anger and fear, for his 2020 campaign.
