By any measure it would be hard to follow President Donald Trump’s transfixing 77-minute press conference on Thursday, but the deputy assistant to the administration, Sebastian Gorka, made a good fist of it.
During an 11-minute volley, he whacked back question after question from an exasperated Evan Davis, accusing the BBC’s Newsnight host of “falling into the trap of fake news”, of “bias”, and of being “a little bit obsessive”.
It was an extraordinary performance from British-born Gorka, who was a little-known figure in the UK until he was catapulted from the post of national security editor at rightwing website Breitbart News into the heart of Trump’s national security team.
Today he is the highest profile member of a band of British cheerleaders popping up on TV screens and in Twitter feeds either championing, or sympathising, with the new US president over his media blues.
They include former Ukip leader Nigel Farage and Bristol-based multi-millionaire Ukip donor Arron Banks, and former tabloid editor Piers Morgan, who have all voiced their concerns over the treatment of Trump by the mainstream media.
Gorka, who is in his 40s, was born in London to Hungarian parents who had fled during the country’s 1956 failed anti-Soviet revolution. His wearing of his father’s medal by the Hungarian group Vitezi Rend – or Order of Heroes – at the inaugural ball for the president raised eyebrows, as the group, which was anti-Soviet, has been linked by some to Nazi colluders.
Gorka told Breitbart News he wore it in memory of his father who had been tortured and imprisoned by Hungarian communists in the late 1940s, and was awarded the medal in 1979. It reminded him of “what they suffered under the Nazis and under the communists”.
Gorka moved to the US nine years ago, becoming a citizen in 2012, having attended St Benedicts school, Ealing and the University of London before graduating from Budapest and studying for a PhD in political science. He worked in the ministry of defence for the Hungarian government, then later specialised in transatlantic security and counter terrorism, and worked for the Rand Corp Washington thinktank before lecturing at military colleges.
He and his US wife, Katharine, have collaborated on research on the Islamic terrorist threat, becoming well known in far-right circles. He said at a talk in Florida that their “pillow talk” was of Islamic State and al-Qaeda, according to Politico. She was part of the Trump transition team for Department of Homeland Security.
In November Gorka was cleared of a weapons charge after attempting to board a flight at Reagan National airport in January with a 9mm handgun in his luggage.
At Breitbart News he worked for Steve Bannon, who is now Trump’s chief strategist. As deputy assistant, Gorka reports to him.
Gorka, who told Newsnight, “I’ve never worked at this rarified, strategic level before”, described Trump’s press conference performance as “fabulous” and said it showcased “the old Donald Trump from the campaign”. He accused the media of “agenda-driven distortion”.
Others in Britain have signalled their sympathy with Trump over the media.
Morgan, the former tabloid journalist and editor, and now a TV presenter and columnist, has defended his friendship with Trump, whom he met on the reality show Celebrity Apprentice, though admitted his politics would not have allowed him to vote for him. He took to the airways to denounce the mainstream media for fuelling “hysterical” attacks on Trump.
“There is an absolutely frenzied and concerted attempt to delegitimise, sabotage and destroy the Trump presidency before it’s even started,” he told US cable channel Fox News earlier this week. “I think that is un-American,” he added. Coverage, driven by the New York Times, said Morgan, was “nakedly partisan” and bordering on an “often nakedly abusive treatment of a new president”.
Farage, who helped campaign for Trump and defended his “grab them by the pussy” remarks as mere “alpha male boasting”, said on his LBC show that “much of the liberal media establishment were losing the trust of the public”, pointing to a poll showing Trump’s approval rating hitting 55% . “He’s doing what the American people elected him to do”, he tweeted.
Banks, who ran the Leave.EU group and famously met Trump with Farage days after the election, when the Brexiteers were photographed in front of Trump Tower’s gold elevator, took swipes at the media and at the BBC on Twitter. On Trump’s approval ratings, he wrote: “That’s because he’s doing stuff – you know, following through on campaign promises. Shocking behaviour.”
In another tweet he had a dig at BBC presenter Jon Sopel’s press conference retort to Trump that the BBC was “impartial, free and fair’’. “As long as the BBC is funded by the public it’s not free, and certainly not fair and balanced when it comes to Trump,” Banks tweeted.
He later re-tweeted, from Andy Wigmore, former Leave.EU communications director: “Has to be one of the best press conferences ever – loved seeing the liberal media implode with shock and angers worth every second lol.”
