Steve Bannon Tells Macomb Crowd They 'Saved The Country'

WARREN (WWJ) -  On the anniversary of  Donald Trump's election to the nation's highest office, former White House adviser Steve Bannon spoke to a packed house at a Republican Unity Dinner on Wednesday in Warren.

Bannon praised the voters in Macomb County -- a segment which helped deliver Michigan to the Trump campaign in 2016 and told the crowd that there is still hard work ahead.

"Macomb County has got to lead the way. It's got to lead the way in '18, it's got to lead the way in '20 we got to get bigger, we got to get tougher."

Media executive and political activist Bannon — who in August left his role as a chief strategist for Trump, and now heads up far-right news, opinion and commentary website Breitbart —was an invited guest speaker at a Macomb County Republican Unity Dinner at Andiamo Restorante.

"You guys have the power - the only thing you have to understand is how to use it. You didn't listen to the mainstream media, you didn't listen to the spin, you didn't listen to all the attack ads. You went to the ballot box and you voted. And you saved the country," said Bannon. "It's the reason I had to come here tonight."

Calling Washington D.C. a "lethal place," he once again referred to the president as "an agent of change" in need of support.

Bannon's appearance was not without protest -- about 50 people demonstrated outside the restaurant where Bannon spoke to an audience of about 800.

Robert Fidler, media director for the Metro-Detroit Political Action Network, told WWJ the group was protesting what they're calling the Macomb County GOP's decision to promote "a blatant white supremacist."

"While serving as Trump's chief strategist, Bannon was the mind behind the administration's most virulently racist policies. The attempted ban of Muslim refugees traveling to the US, and tearing the families apart of people of color through ICE's mass deportation campaign. The latter hitting the Chaldean community of Metro-Detroit especially hard," Fidler said, in a news release. "Additionally, he was reported to be the prominent voice behind Trump's attempt to enact a ban on transgender people serving in the military."