Former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon called out Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) winless streak in 2017 on Tuesday evening and said the D.C. establishment is terrified of the economic nationalist movement that is gaining momentum from Alabama to Arizona and poised to send more of McConnell’s allies packing.
Bannon addressed a reception for conservative Arizona Senate candidate Kelli Ward, who is challenging establishment Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), before speaking at her rally. Bannon said the “populist revolt” is an “incredibly powerful movement” of “working-class and middle-class people” who are fed up with the “permanent political class and the globalist set of elites that want to rule over you from an imperial city like a new aristocracy.”
“They can care less about your economic well-being. They can care less about your family. They can care less about your children and grandchildren,” Bannon said of the D.C. elite, pointing out that seven of the nine richest counties are around D.C. because “they have a business model that works for them — the consultant, lobbyist, donor, corporatist, and politician class.”
“They’re afraid of you,” Bannon told the raucous crowd. “You are an existential threat to their business model.”
He said President Donald Trump gave up his private life because “he had a duty to the people and the citizens of the United States of America,” and Bannon reminded the crowd that when the establishment attacks Trump and Ward, they are actually “trying to shut you up.”
Bannon said the D.C. establishment holds working-class Americans in “total and complete contempt” and added that he would rather be governed by the first 100 people who showed up at the rally than the top 100 partners at Goldman Sachs.
The Breitbart News Executive Chairman also mocked McConnell’s statement on Monday about how “winners make policy and losers go home.”
Before the Third Saturday in October, Bannon said “Mitch is 0-2,” referring to the Senate Majority Leader’s losses in Alabama and Tennessee.
He said McConnell’s candidate lost in Alabama and he “lost in Tennessee,” referring to establishment Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), who was so terrified of losing in his primary that he somehow announced that he will retire from the Senate before embattled Tennessee football head coach Butch Jones resigned or was fired.
“Note to self, Mitch: Big Luther Strange and Little Bobby Corker are both going home,” Bannon heckled McConnell at the rally. “The people of Alabama and the people of Tennessee have spoken. Your folks are going home, and their folks are making policy.”
Bannon blasted the D.C. establishment’s “disrespect” for Trump along with their backstabbing and bickering. He accused the establishment of thwarting Trump’s economic nationalist agenda that will make America great again.
“They have sown the wind, and they’re going to reap the whirlwind,” Bannon said. “And that whirlwind is Kelli Ward.”
Bannon said Ward believes in securing the border, fair trade deals, and bringing back good-paying manufacturing jobs to Arizona
“We’re building a grassroots army,” Bannon said. “It’s going to be their money versus your muscle.”
Influential conservative host Laura Ingraham invited Bannon to speak at the event, and she said Bannon is “the man in black” who “riles up all the right people” and is a “warrior for populism and economic nationalism.”