Steve Bannon headlines Greenville GOP convention, says foes ‘out to destroy our country’

In his keynote speech to the Greenville County Republican Party convention on Monday, Steve Bannon told the gathering of delegates and other audience members that they have set an example for the nation.

“You grabbed power from the establishment and said, ‘Go screw yourself!’” he said to an enthusiastic, sometimes raucous, crowd of about 800 inside the Greenville Convention Center.

Bannon is host of the War Room podcast and a former advisor to President Donald Trump. His aggressively populist message pitting “elites” against everyday Americans has made him a voice in the Make America Great Again – MAGA – movement.

The recent history of the Greenville GOP is “extraordinary,” Bannon said. Following a takeover in 2021, the party has been dominated by the polarizing “America First” caucus.

The faction is led by attorney Jeff Davis, who was elected on Monday to serve as county party chair. He held the position previously before being elected executive committeeman for the state GOP.

Davis said his goal as chairman is “hardening and growing our party” and to keep “RINOs” – that stands for Republicans in Name Only – from power.

In addition to Bannon, the slate of speakers on Monday included U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC 1st District), state treasurer Curtis Loftis, and WORD radio host Bill Frady.

Several themes were at the forefront throughout the event: the unfounded claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump, that establishment politicians and business leaders have ripped off working-class and middle-class Americans, and that God is firmly on the side of Trump and MAGA voters.

Mace, who was elected to Congress in 2020 and reelected twice since, said, “South Carolina carried me. God carried me.”

According to Bannon, God carried Trump, too. “It was divine providence,” he said.

It’s also an article of faith among activists that Trump, not former President Joe Biden, was the rightful winner of the 2020 election. That belief helped to animate the grassroots fervor of Greenville’s America First caucus, said Yvonne Julian, who served as party chair before being elected Monday to serve on the state executive committee.

“It motivated a lot of people,” she said.

In a short interview before his speech, Bannon said voting machines may have been manipulated in favor of Biden. He pointed to a report by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard that electronic voting machines may be susceptible to hacking. Otherwise, he presented no specific evidence.

Allegations of systematic fraud in the 2020 election have been unproven.

But onstage, Bannon made the claim central to his message.

Early in the speech, he exclaimed, “Trump won, right? They stole it, right?”

“Yes!” many in the crowd shouted back.

The mood among attendees was largely celebratory. There were colorful shirts, jackets, hats, and jewelry displaying Trump’s name or with MAGA branding. Vendors sold pro-Trump flags. People posed together beside a life-size Trump cutout.

But there were darker undercurrents, too.

The nation is in “a battle between good and evil,” said Mace, adding that the political opposition is doing “the devil’s work.”

Frady openly talked about political violence. “We don’t want to go that way,” he said. “But I fear it’s not going to matter what we want. That’s just something to be mindful of.”

Bannon’s speech hit his targets with an array of incendiary adjectives: “sociopathic,” “atheistic,” and “neo-Marxist.”

Bannon claimed that the country is in “far greater danger” than at the outset of the American Revolution, the Civil War, or World War II. Economic elites and liberal politicians, he said, “are out to destroy our country.”

And that talk of a stolen presidential election in 2020: It has not only motivated MAGA Republicans to get involved in Greenville County party politics. It has some people angling for retribution.

“It’s just a matter of time before we find out it was stolen,” said party secretary Angie Fisher. The people she thinks were involved in the theft “are traitors to our country.”

She added, “Everybody knows what the sentence for treason is. They just never anticipated Trump would be back.”

In a prepared statement, Greenville County Democratic Party chair Stacey Mars skewered Bannon and “those with his beliefs” for “hatred, division, and chaos.”

A small group of protesters gathered outside the convention.

Bannon’s legal situation in recent years has been closely linked to Trump.

In 2021, he received a pardon from Trump. He had been indicted by a federal grand jury with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering in connection to a fundraising effort claiming to support the building of a wall along the border between the United States and Mexico. The state of New York took up the matter, and Bannon pleaded guilty in February to one state felony charge.

Bannon was found guilty in 2022 of contempt of Congress after he refused to comply with a subpoena to appear at a hearing of the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 attack. He served a short prison sentence in 2024.

Inside the hall on Monday, Bannon assured his audience that Trump isn’t just back – he’s on track for a third term.

Bannon is unfazed by the wording of the 22nd Amendment – including that “(n)o person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.”

In the interview before his speech, Bannon referred to “Trump’s Article II powers” and “alternatives” to abiding by the commonly understood text of the 22nd Amendment.

Asked what those alternatives might be, Bannon was unspecific. “We haven’t disclosed them yet,” he said. “But I think other people have worked on it and come up with some ideas.”

Mace’s political future is a topic of much interest in the state. She is widely considered to have her sights on the governor’s office. She didn’t declare her intention to run Monday night, but she made sure to let attendees know that the 2026 race was on her mind.

“We have a lot of elections next year, including an election for governor,” she said. “It’s important that we choose a candidate who actually has a record of implementing an America First agenda. Promise me you will make that happen.”

This article originally appeared on Greenville News: Steve Bannon talks 2020 election, retribution at Greenville GOP event