In response, Bannon released a statement reflecting on his time with the publication which indicated that he was "proud of what the Breitbart team has accomplished in so short a period of time."
Bannon's departure, according to reports, was pushed by Rebekah Mercer, a major financial patron of Breitbart who was less than thrilled with the 64-year-old's comments regarding a certain meeting between Donald Trump, Jr. and a Russian lawyer during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Bannon, in comments later published in Michael Wolff's "Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House," described the Trump Tower meeting as "treasonous" and "unpatriotic."
In the end, it was Bannon's need to appear powerful that led to his ouster from Breitbart, according to investigative reporter Dave Lindorff.
Speaking to Radio Sputnik's Loud & Clear, Lindorff said the Virginian journalist ultimately forgot to tell Wolff what was and what wasn't "on the record."
"As a reporter… one of the things i've learned is that if you talk with someone long enough who has these self images of being really powerful they do kind of forget that they have vulnerabilities… especially if you're [interviewing them repeatedly], they forget after a while to say ‘this is off the record,'" the CounterPunch columnist said. "It's very common and then they'll come back and say ‘oh by the way that was off the record,' and then you just have to say ‘no it wasn't, that's not how it works.'"
"They forget that they don't really have control of the outcome… it's in keeping that [Bannon] would have sort of wanted to glorify himself to this reporter and he thought that's how it would be done," Lindorff added.
And just as Bannon started backtracking his statements, the coffin was sealed, says Lindorff.
"He sort of gave it up and showed how bad this was for him when he tried to apologize and get back in Trump's good graces, which was blown off," Lindorff told show hosts Brian Becker and John Kiriakou. "This is not a guy with a history of making apologies, he's somebody who actually trashed people for making apologies… it's like a sign of weakness [for him]."
But when it comes to the future of Breitbart, Lindorff believes Bannon's removal is going to do nothing but hurt the organization.
"[Bannon] is a guy who's organizationally competent, he's smart and I suspect that he's the brains behind the outfit and that's going to hurt Breitbart a lot," he noted.
A founding member of Breitbart's board in 2007, Bannon later became the outlet's executive chair in March 2012 after founder Andrew Breitbart died from heart failure. He left Breitbart to join Trump on his presidential campaign in 2016, and Bannon would later become the White House chief strategist before leaving in August 2017 and returning to Breitbart.
