On July 15, 2016, the day the Trump campaign announced that it had selected Pence, Breitbart’s former technology editor Milo Yiannopoulos wrote to Bannon and Breitbart editor Alex Marlow.

“Seems like a bad pick. Should I tweet something ambivalent about him? People are telling me Trump likely didn’t want this. …What’s our party line on this?”

“This is the price we pay for cruzbots and #nevertrump movement,” Bannon responded. “An unfortunate necessity…very. feel free to do whatever u want. we, as always, will remain above it all.”