Before Donald Trump began his campaign for the presidency, his chief strategist Steve Bannon planned to help former Alaska governor Sarah Palin run for the job.
Politico reported Friday that in 2011, Bannon was a filmmaker who had made two movies about the Tea Party movement. Rebecca Mansour, a former aide and speechwriter for Palin, approached him to work on videos for a possible Palin campaign.
Mansour told Politico that Bannon viewed Palin as "an existential threat to not just the progressive left, but also to the entrenched country club Republican Party." Instead of the campaign videos, Bannon independently produced a full-length biography movie about Palin.
"The Undefeated" came out in July 2011, and focused on her rise to the Republican vice-presidential nomination with John McCain in 2008. The movie said that GOP establishment members targeted her for downfall.
Politico's report said that mainstream media reviews gave the movie poor ratings, because it did not address any Palin controversies. Bannon, however, said he intended the film to address Palin in a positive light. In September 2011, Bannon discussed the film on the radio show "Palin Update," saying, "I couldn't make this film about any other political leader in the country… I love all things Palin."
Palin announced on Oct. 5, 2011, that she would not seek the Republican nomination because she wanted to focus on her family. Politico reported that Bannon did not give up on his support for her; in March 2012, after Bannon took charge of the Breitbart News site upon its founder Andrew Breitbart's unexpected death, he focused on her there. Palin herself write op-eds for the site, and Bannon wrote columns praising her.
In one column, he said the working class sees Palin as "someone who fights for them," Politico reported, apparently previewing themes he would later use in support of Trump. The real-estate mogul announced he would run for president on June 16, 2015, and Palin threw her support behind him. Bannon joined in, saying Trump's voice in a 2011 book was "refreshingly blunt and authentic."
The former Alaska governor added her voice to Bannon's Trump support on July 31, 2015 in a Breitbart opinion piece, saying, "The elites are shocked by Trump's dominance, but everyday Americans aren't… Trump has tapped into America's great populist tradition by speaking to concerns of working class voters."
Mansour said that Bannon had found a kindred spirit in Trump. Former Breitbart editor Ben Shapiro wrote in Daily Wire that, "Steve Bannon turned Breitbart into Trump Pravda," referencing the Russian government's state newspaper.
Bannon became Trump's campaign CEO on August 17, 2016, Politico reported.
Palin has publicly supported Bannon, arguing in a Facebook post that negative coverage of Bannon results from the mainstream media's mission of "personal destruction."
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