Steve Bannon

—Praised Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government for its homophobia and transphobia. In conversation with Erik Prince, founder of the military contracting firm Blackwater USA (and brother of Trump’s Education secretary, Betsy DeVos) on his podcast War Room, “Putin ain’t woke. He is anti-woke,” Bannon said, to which Prince responded, “The Russian people still know which bathroom to use.” Bannon asked how many genders there are in Russia; “Two,” said Prince. Bannon further praised Russia for not flying LGBTQ Pride flags, and Prince noted, “They don’t have boys swimming in girls’ college swim meets,” a reference to transgender athletes. “How savage,” Bannon said sarcastically. “How medieval.” Putin is notorious for enacting the “gay propaganda” law in 2013, which prohibits any mention of LGBTQ issues or identities in venues accessible to minors, effectively banning Pride parades and further fomenting anti-LGBTQ sentiment in a nation without a free press.

—Launched a secret plan devised by Chris Gacek, a former congressional staffer and an official at the anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, to infiltrate Facebook and place a mole in the company. “Flood the zone with candidates of all stripe [sic] who will report back to you / Milo with INTEL about the job application process over at FB,” Gacek emailed to Bannon about job openings at Facebook. Bannon assigned then-Breitbart news tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos to the task of sending, emailing “Can u get on this.”

—While at Breitbart, devised the term “Big Gay Hate Machine” to target LGBTQ activists and organizations as a way of attacking the political left. His first foray into this was an article by Austin Ruse attacking the legacy of Matthew Shepard, the 19-year-old gay man who was murdered in 1998 and became the namesake of anti-discrimination legislation and a national symbol. “Almost everything you think you know about the Matthew Shepard narrative is false,” that his story was “hagiography” and a lie, and proof that “the agenda of the sexual left lives on lies.”

—Bragged that under his chairmanship, Breitbart became “the platform for the alt-right.” Former Breitbart writer Ben Shapiro says Bannon “allowed the site to be taken over and used by a bunch of alt-right people who are not fond of Jews, are not fond of minorities.”

—Boasted of Breitbart’s influence: “On the social conservative side, we’re the voice of the anti-abortion movement, the voice of the traditional marriage movement, and I can tell you we’re winning victory after victory after victory.”

—Under his chairmanship, Breitbart became known for headlines such as “Trannies 49Xs Higher HIV Rate,” “Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy,” “Hoist it high and proud: The Confederate Flag Proclaims A Glorious Heritage” and “Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew.” The site also purposely misgenders prominent transgender activists.

—Claimed Target’s inclusivity of transgender individuals seeks “to exclude people who are decent, hard-working people who don’t want their four-year-old daughter to have to go into a bathroom with a guy with a beard in a dress.”

—Decried progressive women as “a bunch of dykes that came from the Seven Sisters schools up in New England.”

—After Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson made a spate of anti-gay comments, Bannon gave him an award: “Phil and his family have been that breath of fresh air Hollywood desperately needed. They are taking their faith and conservative politics mainstream. Phil has the guts to do and say what most politicians in Washington won’t: You must adhere to your conservative beliefs, all of them, and never surrender or compromise them for anyone. We are proud supporters of the Robertsons.

—Invited author Robert Reilly onto his Breitbart radio show in order to promote Reilly’s aggressively anti-LGBTQ propaganda book, Making Gay Okay: How Rationalizing Homosexual Behavior is Changing Everything.