JOHN NORTHCOTT: (HOST): The big headline today, of course, is Steve Bannon’s appointment to the Trump inner circle. What do you make of that appointment?

CARLOS MAZA: So it’s a really scary sign for anyone who was hoping or maybe praying that the way Trump behaved during the campaign would be different once he entered office. Steve Bannon is someone who is known mainly for leading the right-wing website in the United States, Breitbart, which is described as an alt-right or conservative website but is really just a white nationalist website. It peddles in some of the most extreme racist, anti-Semitic, anti-LGBT tropes imaginable. He became Trump’s campaign CEO during the campaign and was advising him very closely, so it’s maybe not surprising that he’s been promoted to the senior adviser position. But for anyone who was hoping that Trump’s rhetoric was just that, we now have someone in the most powerful office in the world, maybe, who has spent his life making racism and anti-Semitism a mainstay of conservative American politics.

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NORTHCOTT: Is there any way that Bannon can separate himself from the previous person he was? He’s led so many different lives over his career: a film producer, now of course a media mogul. Do you think he’s just putting those headlines up there because it brings eyeballs, or is he going to bring that kind of sensibility right to the White House?

MAZA: I don’t think it’s just for eyeballs. If you look at the personal statements that he’s made in his personal life, his view is really that his job is to wed the alt-right, white nationalist movement in the United States with mainstream political conservatism. Breitbart is one way of doing that, but I think he sees the Trump campaign, and now the the Trump administration, as really his ticket to making what has previously been relegated to the fringe of the Internet, the headlines that you mentioned, to being a central part of messaging coming out of the White House. And you’ve seen him do it in the way he’s influenced Trump during the campaign. You’ve seen him do it in his personal comments about what he thinks about groups like Jewish people, and I think you’ve seen it especially through his work. And I’d be very surprised, and I think that most anyone who’s concerned about the Trump administration should take both Bannon and Trump’s comments and behavior at face value and believe them when they say the things that they’re saying.

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NORTHCOTT: We’ve seen people take to the streets all across the United States and even here in Canada. What effect do you think the appointment of Bannon might have to those protests? Fuel to the fire?

MAZA: I think what it does is give evidence to people who are concerned about what Trump’s candidacy and campaign and presidency will look like, evidence that their concerns are real. It is easy to downplay and try to normalize Trump’s presidency so far as typical conservatism or typical Republicanism, but what is happening already is the merging of white nationalists, open racists and anti-Semites, with the most powerful office in the country. And those people who are protesting who see this administration, this upcoming administration, as a real threat to some of the basic bedrock values we hold as Americans, have reason to believe that their concerns are justified and that the next four years are going to really look like a very different type of Republicanism and a very different type of acceptable politics, acceptable political norms, than most of us have ever experienced or been used to.

Previously:

A White Nationalist Who Hates Jews Will Be Trump's Right-Hand Man In The White House

Fox & Friends Is “Amazed” At Negativity After Trump Makes Anti-Semite, White Nationalist Steve Bannon His Chief Strategist

Fox Thinks “Controversy” Surrounding Trump's White Nationalist-Enabling Adviser Stephen Bannon Is That He Doesn't Like Paul Ryan