What Is Steve Bannon Thinking? Explosive Sit-Down With Alleged Iranian Agent Raises Alarms

Bannon and Parsi also discussed their vision for a genuine "America First" foreign policy.

Bannon, during his War Room podcast on Tuesday, expressed his concerns to Parsi, the former head of the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), a pro-Iran lobbying group. "You still have these massive forces inside the United States that are not America first," Bannon said, according to The Washington Free Beacon. He further emphasized the need to prioritize the country and its citizens, criticizing those who he believes put Israel first.

September 03, 2025

Parsi, currently the vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, funded by Koch and Soros, was once embroiled in a libel lawsuit in 2008. The lawsuit, filed against an Iranian-American human rights activist who accused Parsi of being an agent for the Iranian regime, was dismissed by a federal judge.

The judge stated that Parsi's work was "not inconsistent with the idea that he was first and foremost an advocate for the regime."

In his conversation with Bannon, Parsi argued for the United States to withdraw from the Middle East, stating that the region is "not that important to the United States any longer." He dismissed the idea that America's withdrawal would enhance Iran's influence in the region, stating that it doesn't significantly impact American interests who dominates the region.

Bannon, while not addressing Parsi's controversial tenure at the NIAC, did note that critics of Parsi and the Quincy Institute have accused the think tank and its leadership of being "just a bunch of Koch-brother-sponsored libertarians, open borders, want-to-retreat isolationist defeatists."

Parsi defended his stance, stating that the "whole thing about isolationism is just a red herring," and that he supports a pro-American foreign policy. He argued that constant attempts to dominate every corner of the world lead to perpetual war, a cycle he believes needs to end.

During Parsi's time at the NIAC, he and the organization faced allegations of lobbying directly for the Iranian regime. In 2013, a federal district court judge ordered the NIAC to pay over $180,000 to the legal defense fund of the Iranian-American human rights activist whom NIAC had sued for libel. Congressional leaders also claimed that the NIAC violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which mandates lobbyists for foreign governments to disclose the nature of their work.

Parsi gained attention in 2020 when he echoed anti-Trump sentiments initially voiced by senior Iranian officials. He wrote that the administration's stance on the violent protests in Portland that year was a "sign of America's endless wars coming home."

The Quincy Institute, where Parsi now serves, has been making efforts to promote isolationist positions within the Republican Party. However, their attempts to influence the Trump administration's Middle East policy fell short. Instead, the president made significant progress towards normalizing Israeli-Arab relations through the Abraham Accords, relocated the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, and eliminated former Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps leader Qassem Soleimani.

Despite these setbacks, Parsi continued to seek alliances with right-leaning isolationists who have the president's ear. During the Israel-Iran conflict over Tehran's nuclear program this summer, Parsi praised Tucker Carlson for opposing the "neocon red line of zero enrichment."

However, Parsi's advocacy seems to have had little effect. Not only did Trump join Israel's strikes on the Iranian nuclear program, but a significant majority of the President's voters supported his actions. A GrayHouse poll taken shortly after the U.S. strikes revealed that 87% of Trump voters agreed that "Iran obtaining nuclear weapons would be an existential threat to the United States and our allies that justifies military action to prevent," while 74% felt that the attack made America either "much safer" or "somewhat safer."