Matter of Opinion · New York Times Opinion

Steve Bannon on ‘Broligarchs’ vs. Populism

January 31, 2025·1 hr 10 min·5 clips

As soon as they can replace workers with digital serfs, they will do it.

In this extended interview, Ross Douthat sits down with Steve Bannon for a wide-ranging conversation about populist nationalism, the tech right, and the future of the Trump movement. Bannon traces his political evolution from a working-class Kennedy Democrat family through Goldman Sachs and Breitbart to discovering Trumps populist potential at a 2014 cattle call. He credits Sean Trendes missing white voters analysis as the intellectual foundation for the 2016 strategy of winning the blue wall states. On the tech right, Bannon is scathing: he calls Andreessen, Musk, and the other broligarchs progressive leftist techno-feudalists who only joined Trumps movement after he won Pennsylvania. He argues Silicon Valleys business model is fundamentally about replacing human workers with digital serfs. The most striking section is Bannons warning about transhumanism: he claims that within ten years, people will face personal decisions about whether to genetically enhance themselves or their children to remain competitive. He calls for antitrust action against tech monopolies, keeping Lina Khan in place, and a public debate about AIs trajectory. Throughout, Douthat pushes back on Bannons framing, noting that Trumps own positions, particularly on TikTok, shift based on political incentives. Bannon concedes the future of populism is lashed to Trump personally, and that all the fundamental questions about sovereignty and humankinds direction will play out in the next four years.

As heard by us

A clear look at the Trump-world split between populist classic and the newer tech right.

Matter of Opinion frames Steve Bannon as a useful stress test for Trumpism: the older populist and nationalist wing that helped bring Trump to power, set against the newer tech right already in view with Mark Andreessen.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

You want the Bannon-versus-tech-right fight, with the argument laid out instead of turned into cable-news sludge.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Matter of Opinion