| | | | | Good Friday evening to everyone. What a day it has been! This is Oliver Darcy here, filling in for Brian Stelter, who picked the wrong day to go hiking. | | 'Now I'm free. I've got my hands back on my weapons' | | | SPECIAL EDITION: BANNON RETURNS TO BREITBART | | It happened fast. Mere hours after being was ousted from his post as White House chief strategist, Steve Bannon returned to Breitbart as the far-right news website's executive chairman -- even chairing the outlet's evening editorial call.
>> Bannon is expected to use his perch at Breitbart to zero in on individuals in President Trump's circle whom he has clashed with, or who are viewed by Bannon and allies as Democrats or "globalists." The website is already preparing for "#WAR." One source at Breitbart told me the website has already started to prepare stories critical of such people.
>> A person who recently spoke to Bannon told me: "It will be Bannon the Barbarian. He's not going to go out peacefully."
>> In a brazen interview with the Weekly Standard, Bannon confirmed this: "I feel jacked up. Now I'm free. I've got my hands back on my weapons. Someone said, 'it's Bannon the Barbarian.' I am definitely going to crush the opposition. There's no doubt. I built a f***ing machine at Breitbart. And now I'm about to go back, knowing what I know, and we're about to rev that machine up. And rev it up we will do." | | Reactions mixed inside Breitbart | | The mood inside Breitbart was mixed about Bannon's return. One person familiar with the matter told me that there was a contingent of Breitbart staffers who desperately wanted Bannon to return.
But a separate person told me others had hoped Bannon would not return, citing the brash and bombastic manner in which he worked with employees. | | How the Bannon news broke | | 11:14 a.m. ET: Axios' Jonathan Swan tweeted his scoop that a decision was "imminent from White House chief of staff John Kelly" and that Bannon's firing was expected.
11:53 a.m. ET: The Drudge Report posts a poll: "What will Bannon do if he leaves White House?"
12:28 p.m. ET: Matt Drudge tweets, "Bannon had one hell of a run..." Drudge's website went with the news that Bannon was out not long after.
12:42 p.m. ET: Maggie Haberman of The New York Times tweets her story confirming the news: "Bannon going - admin officials say it was Trump, people close to Bannon insist he resigned."
5:18 p.m. ET: Bloomberg's Joshua Green, author of the book that may have played a role in Bannon's exit, tweets that he has just spoken with Bannon, adds that Bannon sounded "like he'd just consumed 40 Red Bulls."
6:01 p.m. ET: Breitbart White House reporter Charlie Spiering tweets Bannon has returned to Breitbart as executive chairman.
6:18 p.m. ET: The Weekly Standard posts its no-holds-barred interview with Bannon. | | Internal Breitbart reaction to Bannon's firing | | In messages I obtained from the company's internal Slack channels, Breitbart Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow reacted to news Bannon had been fired by instructing his staff to "round up hysterical reactions and gloating" by the mainstream media and Hollywood. He entrusted Matthew Boyle with the task of "putting together a narrative story." You can read my full story here...
>> Marlow also told his staff in the immediate wake of the news that he was in the dark on whether Bannon would be returning to the website, writing he was "not sure exactly when he's out officially or if he's coming back."
>> And Marlow tried to get a grip on the website's public relations. He offered a "friendly reminder" to staffers that "tweeting tends to do more harm than good."
>> Brian Lowry emails: "That line about rounding up 'hysterical reactions and gloating' by mainstream media and Hollywood is really the anti-anti-Trump mentality in a nutshell. And it's also, notably, a strategy that's been increasingly popular at Fox News as the administration comes under fire. Not so much, 'Look at what the president said,' but, 'Look at this person you don't like who's having a conniption fit over what the President said.'" | | Bannon's stunning words to the Weekly Standard | | In his blunt interview with the Weekly Standard, Bannon declared, "The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over."
>> Bannon continued: "We still have a huge movement, and we will make something of this Trump presidency. But that presidency is over. It'll be something else. And there'll be all kinds of fights, and there'll be good days and bad days, but that presidency is over."
| | How much of a threat is Bannon, really? | | Bannon is certainly talking a big game. And Breitbart editors seem to be fully behind him, hyping a potential "#WAR" with the so-called "globalists" inside the Trump White House.
>> But how much influence does the far-right website have? Certainly a little, but it's important to remember that Breitbart is only one piece in what is becoming a very crowded pro-Trump media universe. And there are many other players in it with larger audiences and louder microphones. Think Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, the Drudge Report, and Fox News in general.
>> More importantly, Breitbart's influence is largely tethered to its ability to set narratives in the pro-Trump media space. If other outlets don't play ball, it's unclear how effective it will be at leveraging power.
>> Good point from MSNBC's @BenjySarlin: "For all the talk of Fox's support now, for example, he survived just fine after going to war with them in primaries. Bannon could be same." | | 'What platform is more powerful...than being in the White House?' | | | Dylan Byers appeared earlier on CNN to react to the news. Here's what he said: "I think Bannon, he's a philosopher. And it might be a dark and twisted philosophy, but he's a philosopher nevertheless. He saw Trump as a vessel to sort of advance this populist nationalist agenda. He's going to continue fighting for that, now outside of the White House. ... I think the only question you have to ask is: What platform is more powerful for you than being in the White House, than having the ear of the president of the United States? If you don't have that, how powerful can you really be? That's really what we are going to see in terms of where Bannon goes." Watch Dylan's full reaction here... | | More reaction to the news... | | -- The Drudge Report banner: "TRUMP PREPS FOR NEW SEASON"
-- Former Breitbart editor Ben Shapiro writes about Bannon's next moves: "Bannon won't go straight at Trump. That would be foolish. Instead, he'll pretend to be Trump's ally in fighting the swamp from the outside. ... That means that Bannon will immediately go after a bunch of his old enemies. ... So Bannon will pretend that Trump's foibles are really just Trump being misled by others. Until, that is, Bannon finds a convenient way to turn on Trump himself." Read Shapiro's piece here...
-- Chris Cillizza: "Donald Trump fired Steve Bannon. But Bannon still won."
-- @jimsciutto: "Question: Until a few hrs ago, Bannon had a top-level security clearance. Now he runs a news site. Did he sign/commit to any restrictions?"
-- @RogerJStoneJr: "I think @StevenKBannon will be more effective for the @realDonaldTrump agenda from the outside #firebrand"
-- @gabrielsherman: "Just talked to Breitbart editor Matt Boyle about Bannon's return to Breitbart: 'We're in a loud bar celebrating the return of our captain!'"
-- @IngrahamAngle: "When I heard they were throwing Bannon to the lions, I thought to myself--the poor lions."
-- Washington Post's Paul Waldman: "Steve Bannon is out. That's good, but the problem is still Donald Trump."
-- Ann Coulter: "I'm ticked off at the Emperor God." Read her interview with the Daily Beast here...
-- Tucker Carlson: "Bannon was one of the relatively few senior staff in the White House who wouldn't feel at home in a Hillary Clinton administration." Watch the clip via Mediaite... | | Looking ahead: Is Seb Gorka next? | | Another former Breitbarter-turned-White House official is on thin ice. Two sources told CNN's Jim Acosta that Sebastian Gorka, the bombastic deputy assistant to the president who has clashed with news personalities in several explosive interviews, is being eyed for dismissal.
>> The Daily Beast's Swin Suebsaeng reported earlier in the day that his fate was "extremely uncertain" following Bannon's ouster... | | 🚨 Drudge versus Breitbart? 🚨 | | For anyone who frequents the Drudge Report, it was clear over the last several months that Matt Drudge harbored deep disdain for Bannon. Drudge had been using his highly-trafficked and influential page to target the former White House chief strategist, obsessively highlighting stories critical of him. (Drudge aligned himself with the Ivanka-Kushner wing of the White House, and regularly keeps in contact with them.)
>> So Bannon's ouster prompted the natural question: Would Drudge and Bannon go to war? BuzzFeed's Adrian Carrasquillo suggested it might happen. I'm not so sure. Drudge appeared to extend an olive branch out to Bannon with the language he used in the wake of Bannon's departure. He said, for instance, that Bannon had "one hell of a run" and characterized it as "impressive." And Breitbart played up Drudge's praise in its press release announcing Bannon's return.
>> As Jonathan Swan tweeted, "Are we seeing the beginning of a peace accord between Drudge and Bannon? I think so. ..They need each other on the outside." And Maggie Haberman noted, "You might have noticed Drudge suddenly had an unsourced banner he was leaving." It's perhaps too early to tell what will happen, but it seems for now that the two may have made peace... | | Sunday's "Reliable Sources" guest list | | | Brian Stelter emails from the mountain: I'm awfully glad we booked "Devil's Bargain" author Joshua Green before all this went down. He'll be on Sunday's "Reliable Sources" along with Carl Bernstein, Alice Stewart, Douglas Brinkley, Nikole Hannah-Jones, Jonathan Lemire, and Tanzina Vega. Sunday, 11am ET, CNN... | | -- CNN's Eugene Scott is joining the WashPost's The Fix blog, "where he will report on the politics of identity..." (WashPost)
-- "How Newsman David Muir Became a Style Maverick: Trim dark suits; simple white shirts; solid dark ties. It's a clean, modern look: not stodgy, but authoritative. No small thing, in his line of work." (Esquire)
-- Brooke Baldwin stunned after guest compares Hitler and Lincoln. (Mediaite)
-- Michael D'Antonio argues in his latest that Trump is "the boy in the bubble." (CNN)
-- Bret Baier says this was "clearly the worst week" in Trump's presidency "just by the series of events that happened." (Mediaite) | | President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities dissolves | | | From An Phung's story: "Hollywood and Broadway appear to be taking a page from Wall Street's playbook. The remaining 16 members of the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities resigned in protest on Friday, capping off a dramatic week that included a stream of CEO resignations from two of President Trump's business councils." Read An's full story here... | | Reacting to James Murdoch's $1 million donation | | An emailer reacting to James Murdoch's announcement of a $1 million donation to the ADL: "His business has tried to contribute to a diverse and tolerant society? Really? Has he ever watched Fox News? Give me a break!"
-- Related: Jennifer Rubin says "c'mon," James: "Fox News popularized birtherism, Trumpism and white grievance-mongering, creating a-factual news bubble." Here's her column...
-- Also related: Emily Steele's latest: "For Murdoch Empire, Perhaps a Decisive Point in Relationship to Trump." | | | Listen to this week's "Reliable Sources" podcast | | | Brian emails: Normally we try to keep our mid-week "Reliable Sources" podcast sorta-evergreen, so you can listen a week or two later without feeling like it's dated. But this week's guest is very timely: PRRI CEO Robert P. Jones, author of "The End of White Christian America," has a lot to say about how the recent violence in Charlottesville and the debate over Confederate monuments relates to larger, deep-seated racial and religious tensions in the United States.
-- One of the main points in our discussion: The Charlottesville events can be interpreted as an extreme form of backlash to multiculturalism -- a manifestation of "a sense of loss and nostalgia for a time gone by when white people, white Christians in particular, held unquestioned power." Read Francesca's recap of the pod here, and download/stream it via iTunes... | | Keep tabs on Trump's Twitter feed | | Phillip Bump has created a new tool to keep track of what Trump sees on Twitter. It's @trumps_feed, a handy Twitter account that automatically retweets the accounts the president follows. More information on that here...
CNN also has a similar page that allows you to see what Trump sees when he logs on Twitter. You can check that out here... | | | Photo of the day (via @frankpallotta) | | | Looking forward to Monday's eclipse... | | CBS announced on Friday that Anthony Mason will anchor a two-hour eclipse special, thereby confirming that the big three broadcasters will all be live from 1 til 3pm ET on Monday for the eclipse... PBS will turn around a special edition of "NOVA" about it on Monday night...
CNN is pulling out all the stops for a virtual reality eclipse experience -- live streaming the eclipse from seven different locations on Monday afternoon... | | | By Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman: -- At Poynter, James Warren chats with Robert Kuttner about the backstory to Bannon's surprise call to The American Prospect. (Poynter) -- Also at Poynter, a profile of 23-year-old OANN White House correspondent Trey Yingst. (Poynter) -- Peter Kafka explains why publishers can't stop, won't stop pivoting to video. (Recode) -- Karen K. Ho writes for CJR about the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad NYT story about boba tea, and explains the problem with it. (CJR)
-- Today in Google: 1) Alphabet is working with NYT and FT on testing tools aimed at increasing subscription revenue for publishers. (Bloomberg) 2) ProPublica and Google News Lab are developing a new machine learning app that will help reporters easily leverage data from the Documenting Hate national database for hate crimes, and incorporate it in their stories. (Google) | | Lowry's reviews Two reviews from Brian Lowry: Having previously directed "Kurt & Courtney," Nick Broomfield (here with Rudi Dolezal) turns his attention toward the tragic, conflicted life of Whitney Houston in "Whitney. Can I Be Me," getting a brief theatrical run before landing on Showtime. Read more... Late-summer movies have a bad reputation, and despite the promising pairing of Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson, "The Hitman¹s Bodyguard" mostly lives down to that. The full review... Expecting... Melissah Yang reports: Robin Thicke is set to be a father again. The "Blurred Lines" singer and his girlfriend April Love Geary are expecting their first child together. The baby is due on what would have been the 71st birthday of Thicke's late father, Alan Thicke... Blank space Another from Melissah: Taylor Swift mysteriously erased all her online accounts Friday. The singer's Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube and website have gone black, and some are speculating it may be for a new album... | | | For the record, part three | | | | By Julia Waldow and Howard Cohen: -- YouTube is making it easier to catch up on current events by adding a "breaking news" tab to its mobile apps and homepage. (The Verge) -- Videos that come up on Google mobile searches now include a six-second preview to help you decide if you want to watch the entire clip. (TechCrunch) -- Relativity Media is being sued by an ad agency for allegedly failing to deliver payment for ad campaigns for two films. (Variety)
-- John Dickerson explains to Stephen Colbert why Bob Corker's criticism of Trump is relevant and says that George Washington and Robert Lee "aren't comparable" (The Late Show). | | | Email us at reliablesources@cnn.com... we appreciate every message. The feedback helps us craft the next day's newsletter! | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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