White House chief strategist Steve Bannon's interview with a left-wing media outlet and his comments that the tensions with North Korea are a "sideshow" are an "affront to the president's leadership," former deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove said Thursday.
"Unless he explicitly said this is off the record, and gets agreement from the reporter, and so let's look at it from that angle, he is so full of himself that he thinks that he can diss his colleagues inside the White House and the administration," Rove, a Fox News contributor, told the "America's Newsroom" program.
"[He thinks] that he can say on the record that the president is wrong on one of the most important issues facing the country, namely North Korea," Rove said, "and he can depict himself as the only true believer on the China trade issue, and the rest of his opponents inside the administration as bedwetters, and lay out a strategy, and that nothing will happen."
The interview is "dangerous," as Bannon was saying that he was "bigger" than Trump is, said Rove, and on or off the record, the interview was "pretty extraordinary."
Bannon has claimed that he did not know he was on the record when he did the interview, even though he had contacted the publication, which is not friendly with Trump, reports Axios.
Robert Kuttner, the publication's editor, wrote in his article that "the question of whether the phone call was on or off the record never came up," and that Bannon — who headed Breitbart News before joining the Trump campaign last year — was "probably the most media-savvy person in America."
"Whether it's on the record or off the record, it is a pretty extraordinary interview," Rove said.
Further, if Bannon thought the phone call was off the record, "it is even more disturbing that he is sharing this with a left-wing journalist when he knows nothing about him or he has no previous relationship with him. He felt as a senior White House staffer, he could leak that kind of information to somebody on the outside."
Newsweek reported this week that Trump has not fired Bannon because he is worried about what his reaction will be, and Rove said that could explain the chief strategist's interview.
"It is amazing to me, the president of the United States has to worry about and has to be frightened of a senior staffer, whose attitude towards the president is so dismissive," said Rove. "Now I understand better why everybody in this White House leaks against each other because apparently the president is willing to tolerate it."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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