A raised-arm salute by Steve Bannon that to many resembled a Nazi one incited an outcry Friday not just from liberal critics of President Donald Trump and his allies but also from a leader of the European right.
It came a month after Elon Musk made a similar salute and at a combustible moment when the administration of Trump, who has long been dogged by charges of encouraging far-right extremism, appears to be leaning more aggressively into far-right alliances around the world.
The gesture late Thursday by Bannon, a former chief White House strategist and a longtime thought leader in Trump’s populist movement, immediately drew comparisons to the infamous “Sieg Heil” Nazi salute, as had the one from Musk, the billionaire leading Trump’s cost-cutting efforts, on Inauguration Day.
