How Breitbart turned on Ted Cruz

Source: The Hill | August 19, 2016 | Jonathan Swan

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All of the sources agreed that Bannon was once enthusiastic about Cruz’s presidential candidacy. 

In early 2014, a source who attended a gathering at Bannon’s Capitol Hill townhouse, known as the Breitbart “Embassy” among staff, said that Bannon was telling anybody who would listen that Cruz was the most hardcore conservative likely to run for president and a guy he thought could win. 

“He didn’t outright say he was endorsing Cruz, but he made it clear that Cruz was his guy,” said the same source who was with Bannon that night. 

A year later, Bannon’s opinion had changed. 

The first strike against Cruz came in July 2014, when Cruz joined Bannon’s sworn enemy, the conservative radio host Glenn Beck, on a trip to the U.S.-Mexico border. Cruz’s staff described the trip as a “humanitarian” mission to help a church provide supplies to needy families. 

Bannon thought the trip painted Cruz as soft on illegal immigration, and Breitbart ran a story titled, “Ted Cruz Joins Glenn Beck for ‘Soccer Balls and Teddy Bears’ Event.” 

“Steve was still ranting about that trip six months later,” said a source who worked with Bannon at the time. 

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“Steve has always been basically an anti-trade guy,” said a second source who worked closely with Bannon at the time. “That’s one of the fissures with the Trump and Cruz support. 

“When push comes to shove, Cruz is basically a free-trade guy, and part of the reason why he saw Cruz as the weaker second option, and why he was willing to go after Cruz, was because he didn’t trust that Cruz would hold the line on trade.”

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He saw the billionaire as the most effective tribune of Breitbart’s populist nationalist movement. Bannon and other senior editors at Breitbart also believed that Trump had all but stitched up the nomination.

Breitbart’s slow turn against Cruz was complicated by the fact that a major funder behind Cruz’s presidential campaign, New York hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer, is also a major funder of Breitbart. 

Several prominent Cruz allies registered their distress about Breitbart’s coverage to Mercer’s daughter Rebekah, asking her why she was supporting an outlet that was hurting her candidate, Cruz.

The Mercers, who never opposed Cruz and resolutely backed Bannon as being fair to the senator, eventually came around to Trump. They are now funding an anti-Hillary Clinton super-PAC and are increasingly influential figures in Trump’s orbit, as The Hill has previously reported. They were seen as influential players in Trump’s decision to hire Bannon as his campaign CEO.

When Breitbart’s coverage shifted toward Trump, some say the tone of Breitbart coverage about Cruz never became overly hostile.

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By late 2015, sources working at Breitbart — both those sympathetic and hostile to his leadership — believed that Bannon was privately all-in for Trump but trying at the same time to keep on good terms with the other candidates in case Trump didn’t win.

“As general chairman of Breitbart, he might as well have been general chairman of Trump for president,” said Kurt Bardella, Breitbart’s former spokesman who resigned because he was upset with the company’s direction.

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“I think Steve kind of astutely saw that there was something more than a novelty of Donald Trump being temporary and began moving his chips into the Trump side of the betting table.” 

Bannon’s underlings felt that he’d hitched his wagon to Trump by the time of the first Fox News debate in August — the one where Trump had a famous confrontation with co-moderator Megyn Kelly.

And by January 2016, when Cruz stopped praising Trump and started attacking him as a liberal, Bannon became increasingly enraged and instructed his reporters to hammer Cruz.

Throughout this period, Breitbart staff made no secrets of their close ties to the Trump campaign.

Bannon kept colleagues abreast of his near constant contact with Trump and Corey Lewandowski, who was then Trump’s campaign manager. 

Breitbart’s Washington political editor, Matthew Boyle, had long since established himself as one of Trump’s favorite reporters. That dynamic was on display last summer when, according to The Washington Post, “Boyle, 28, asked Trump about his rising poll numbers … [and] Trump broke into a broad smile and high-fived the young journalist in front of startled onlookers in the post-debate spin room.”

A source who observed several of Boyle’s interactions with Trump staff said that on the campaign trail, Boyle was “actively giving consulting advice to the Trump campaign staffers and strategizing with them while he was reporting on the primary.”

Boyle declined to comment.

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  • Discussion
  • Consistent August 19, 2016 at 5:54 pm #9390

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 5:57 pm #9391

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 5:59 pm #9392

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 6:02 pm #9393

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 6:04 pm #9394

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 6:06 pm #9395

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 6:41 pm #9397

    Consistent August 19, 2016 at 7:16 pm #9401

    CA Surveyor August 19, 2016 at 8:10 pm #9403

    Robert Mercer runs almost every major labor union retirement and health/welfare plan in this country.

    Does anyone think he is not in the tank for democrats?

    slhancock1948 August 19, 2016 at 10:00 pm #9408

    I listened for a few times (on my way to work) to Bannon when people called in to Breitbart. It was EASY to see that he was ALL IN for Trump early on. He was not rude to the Cruz people, but he did not encourage them, either. Anything said about Trump brought on gushing and a lot of other steered questions to make Trump look better than he is. Nothing about Trump in a negative way was EVER left standing. Bannon always “cleared up” any “misunderstandings”. We had to turn Breitbart off, along with David Webb, and others. It is amazing how little time we spend online or the Sirius XM now. One can only take so much!

    Pray for righteousness to be restored and for the peace of Jerusalem

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