White House staff
Senior staff at the White House (L-R) Jared Kushner, Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus attend a swearing in ceremony at the White House in Washington, DC 22 January 2017 REUTERS/Carlos Barria

Donald Trump's chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon launched a scathing attack on the media in an interview to New York Times on Wednesday, saying that the media should be humiliated by the election results.

He also described the press as "the opposition party" to the Trump administration.

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"The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while," he said

"I want you to quote this. The media here is the opposition party. They don't understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States."

Bannon is believed to be one of the strongest forces in the White House and is reportedly one of the few senior advisers in the Trump circle who supported White House Press Secretary, Sean Spicer's confrontational rant about reports of inauguration crowd size.

In the phone interview, he went on to target the media, saying that the mainstream news organisations did not fire anyone associated with or following the campaign. "Look at the Twitter feeds of those people: They were outright activists of the Clinton campaign."

"That's why you have no power. You were humiliated." he said.

When asked if he was concerned about Sean Spicer losing his credibility with the media due to the rant, he said: "Are you kidding me? We think that's a badge of honor. 'Questioning his integrity' — are you kidding me? The media has zero integrity, zero intelligence, and no hard work."