Former White House advisor Steve Bannon used to discuss plans to oust Pope Francis with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, files from the DOJ’s Epstein library revealed.
In June 2019, Bannon appeared to wto have written “Will take down [Pope] Francis,” to the paedophile financier.
“The Clintons, Xi, Francis, EU – come on, brother," he continues.
Steve Bannon, reportedly, identifies as Catholic but was highly critical of Pope Francis due to the latter's progressive agenda. He considered the pope as an opponent to his ‘sovereignist’ vision, a brand of populism which took over Europe in 2018 and 2019.
In a 2018 interview with the Spectator, Bannon had called the pope as “beneath contempt” and accused him of “siding with globalist elites.”
The files appeared to show that Epstein had been helping Bannon to build his movement, CNN reported.
Bannon had also urged Matteo Salvini, now Italy’s deputy prime minister, to “attack” the pontiff, according to Source Material.
In the text messages to Epstein, Bannon asks whether the financier has read the In the Closet of the Vatican, a 2019 book by French journalist Frédéric Martel, which claimed that about 80 per cent of the clergy in the Vatican are gay.
He also showed an interest in turning the book into a film after meeting the author in Paris at a five-star hotel. Bannon also suggested that Epstein be the film’s executive producer. “You are now exec producer of ‘ITCOTV’ (In the closet of the Vatican),” Bannon wrote.
Epstein, however dosent mention the offer in the exchange and instead asks about Banon filming Noam Chomsky, the philosopher and intellectual.
Martel, meanwhile, told the CNN that Bannon wanted to “instrumentalise” the book in his efforts against Pope Francis.
On April 1, 2019, Epstein appears to have sent himself an email, which read “in the closet of the Vatican,” and then later texted Bannon an article titled “Pope Francis or Steve Bannon? Catholics must choose”.
Bannon replies, “easy choice.”
It is not clear whether Bannon was serious about him “taking down” Pope Francis.
Bannon has a history of supporting right-wing Catholic organisation slike the Dignitatis Humanae Institute, which is based in Italy.
He had also set up a Rome bureau of his Breitbart News, a right-wing outlet.
He also wanted to set up a “gladiator school” for Judeo-Christian political training near the city. Those plans were blocked by the Italian government in 2021, which made Bannon furious.
The text messages between Bannon and Epstein were made when the Vatican was under fire for several sex abuse scandals.
Pope Francis, meanwhile, was often at odds with the Trump Administration and was a massive critic of nationalism and anti immigration agenda.
Pope Leo, his successor, who was born in the United States, has also continued the criticism of the “exclusionary mindset" of nationalist movements and operations by Trump’s ICE.
