Steve Bannon likens Congress to Duma as White House officials boast about ruling with 'iron fist,' report says
Source: The Independent
Monday 13 October 2025 09:32 BST
Steve Bannon has likened the Republican-controlled Congress to the Duma – Russia’s largely ceremonial parliamentary assembly – while senior administration advisers have joked about ruling Capitol Hill with an “iron fist,” according to a report.
Explaining the failure of Republican representatives and senators to stand up to President Donald Trump in his second term, his former White House chief strategist told The Wall Street Journal that he believed the president’s four years “in the wilderness” between 2021 and 2025, when Joe Biden was in power, had hardened his resolve to realize his aims. “He’s doing things now he wouldn’t have ever considered the first time,” Bannon said. “He’s jackhammering away on levels you haven’t seen before.”
The WSJ offered the example of House Speaker Mike Johnson turning up at the 40th birthday party of Trump’s Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller at Ned’s Club in Washington, D.C., on August 23 to pay tribute to the official as an example of congressional Republicans bending to the president’s will.
The newspaper also cites the move to name Trump’s signature tax and spending legislation the “One Big Beautiful Bill” over lawmakers' objections as another instance of bending the knee. It describes the decision to quietly drop calls for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files as yet another. “People laying down their arms on the most jealously guarded power that Congress has tells you a lot about what people think their likelihood is of being successful in fighting back,” said Brendan Buck, a one-time aide to Johnson’s predecessor as speaker, Paul Ryan.
Read more: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/steve-bannon-republicans-duma-trump-b2844203.html
They have effectively neutered the GOP and Pootie will soon be laughing all they way to the bank.
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