Bannon Holds Rally for GOP Candidates But None of Them Show Up

Steve Bannon held a rally in upstate New York to support his local Republican candidates but none of them bothered to show up.

No further evidence is needed of just how far Bannon’s political influence has fallen since he was fired as Donald Trump’s chief strategist just over a year ago.

Since no candidates were in attendance Bannon spent the whole time bragging about how important he was to Donald Trump’s victory in 2016. Which revealed to the 200 people in attendance the real purpose of the event: for Bannon to promote himself.

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If Trump had been there to hear Bannon talk, he would not have been pleased at what he heard. In the past Trump has bristled at the notion that his victory was orchestrated by Bannon’s genius instead of his own.

The truth is that Trump is still holding rallies for thousands of his unhinged supporters, but Bannon has become a persona non grata for many GOP insiders.

Michael Caputo—organizer of Buffalo event—said he invited all Republicans running for office in the western New York area but had yet to receive a single reply. Bannon had reportedly been scheduled to appear with David DiPietro, running for the New York state assembly, but he pulled out.

In the first part of his speech at the Jamison Road volunteer firehouse in Elma, New York, Bannon mostly talked up his own importance. It seemed like a desperate attempt by him to put himself back into the national spotlight.

“Let’s go back in time,” Bannon said. “When I came into the campaign as CEO in mid-August 2016, we were down, what – eight,10, 12, 16 points – double-digits down in every battleground state. Not a lot of money, not a lot of organization.”

Then he recalled what he told Trump soon after signing on to help in his presidential campaign.

“I said: ‘The numbers show that working class people in this country will unite around a leader who will return America to her former glory.

“‘This whole campaign is going to be compare and contrast. Hillary Clinton is the representative of a corrupt elite, and you are the voice of the working people in this country.’

After getting booted from the White House, Bannon returned to Breitbart News, the organization he once described as “the platform for the alt-right”.

He was fired from Breitbart in January of this year after saying Donald Trump Jr’s meeting with a Russian lawyer in Trump Tower in June of 2016 was “treasonous. ” (Bannon’s comments were quoted in Michael Wolff’s book Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House.)

Steve Bannon now appears desperate to regain influence in “the alt-right.”

In July we reported that he was setting up a group in Europe for the express purpose of undermining the European Union.

In September we reported that Bannon was “helping to craft the curriculum for a leadership course at a right-wing Roman Catholic institute in Italy, stepping up his efforts to influence conservative thinking in the church.”

Although he does have some people still willing to listen to him, it is now clear that nobody inside the Republican Party wants anything to do with Steve Bannon. Clearly what’s bad news for Steve Bannon is good news for America.

Leo Vidal

I am a lifelong Democrat with a passion for social justice and progressive issues. I have degrees in writing, economics and law from the University of Iowa.