Donald Trump has railed against press coverage of his campaign for months, but the Republican nominee has stepped up his media-bashing tactics as his poll numbers dip and allegations of unwanted sexual advances surface.
Campaign CEO Steve Bannon, the former Breitbart News chief executive, offered a different argument in the run-up to the 2012 election. He criticized Republicans for blaming the media for electoral defeats instead of reexamining their commitment to conservative principles.
“I’m not a whiner. I don’t want to hear that the media’s against us," Bannon said in a 2012 interview on Conservative Radio Forum with hosts Steven Rosenblum and Daria DiGiovanni.
"My problem is conservatives who talk being conservatives and then they want to whine because the media’s kicking our ass. Guess what? We are getting our ass kicked. Deal with it," Bannon said. "We’re supposed to be conservatives. That means you overcome what life throws at you. I don’t want to hear people talk about 'oh, you know, but the media. The big, bad media.'"
"The media not being our side is not a newsflash film at 11. The media hasn't been on our side since the '60s," the former Breitbart head said. "That’s the hand Ronald Reagan was dealt. That’s the hand Richard Nixon was dealt. And they beat ‘em. Why can’t we beat ‘em?"