REUTERS/Moritz Hager
During a stop on his European tour, former White House chief strategist and ex-Breitbart boss Steve Bannon admitted that he is a big fan of Benito Mussolini—and he no longer speaks to President Trump. “He was clearly loved by women. He was a guy’s guy. He has all that virility,” Bannon told The Spectator of the Italian fascist dictator. “He also had amazing fashion sense, right, that whole thing with the uniforms. I’m fascinated by Mussolini.” Bannon also said that he “hated every day” that he was in the White House. “I’m not a staffer,” he said. When asked if he still spoke to President Trump, he responded, “Our lawyers talk because it’s the middle of an investigation. I don’t talk to the president... because it’s better that we don’t chat.” Bannon took his populists beliefs to Zurich to make a speech on Tuesday after he spent some time in Italy to observe its elections and Europe’s “populist surge.” When asked if populism is the new fascism, he replied, “This is all theoretical bullshit. I don’t know. Populism, fascism—who cares? It’s a media smear of the populist movement.”