Trump slams book

White House dismisses ex-chief strategist’s claims as fiction

DONALD Trump savaged his former chief strategist yesterday, declaring Steve Bannon had “lost his mind” after he sensationally panned the president and his family in a new book.

Mr Bannon was an alt-right figurehead whose chaotic six months in the White House ended when he was sacked from President Trump’s inner circle last August.

He co-operated with author Michael Wolff for a new book that purports to tell the inside story of the Trump presidency, but which was dismissed by the White House yesterday as “trashy tabloid fiction”.

Among his most sensational claims were that Donald Trump Jnr and Mr Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner had committed treason by meeting with a Russian lawyer in Trump tower during the 2016 election campaign.

“Even if you thought that this was not treasonous, or unpatriotic, or bad s**t, and I happen to think it’s all of that, you should have called the FBI immediately,” Mr Bannon said.

He also said he believed Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe would uncover money laundering by Trump confidantes.

It also states Mr Trump had no interest in learning about the Constitution, which he knew little about, and preferred to eat at McDonald’s as he was afraid of being poisoned.

The book claims Mr Trump would mention getting in bed with other women.

“Trump liked to say that one of the things that made life worth living was getting your friends’ wives into bed,” it claims.

Mr Trump’s response was far more scathing about the man who has claimed credit for engineering his election victory by bringing right-wing votes.

“Steve Bannon has nothing to do with me or my Presidency,” Mr Trump said in a statement.

“When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind. Steve was a staffer who worked for me after I had already won the nomination by defeating 17 candidates, often described as the most talented field ever assembled in the Republican Party.”