Trump Takes Swipe at Fox News during Steve Bannon Reunion

Former President Donald Trump took a swipe at Fox News during a new interview with his former White House adviser Steve Bannon on Saturday and suggested he couldn't talk about "cheating" in elections on the network.

Trump reiterated unfounded claims that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from him and also briefly jabbed at Fox News, which recently reached a $785.7 million settlement with voting machine company Dominion, which had accused the network of defamation.

The former president's comments also come after Fox News parted ways with longtime host Tucker Carlson - a decision that has been widely criticized by conservatives.

Bannon served as White House chief strategist for the first seven months of Trump's term. He had previously worked as chief executive for Trump's presidential campaign and the two reminisced about the 2016 election during the interview.

Trump told Bannon that "they've weaponized the Justice Department. They've weaponized the FBI. They're doing things that a Communist country would do, a Marxist country would do. It's very sad."

Bannon asked Trump if he ever thought the U.S. would get to the situation he was describing with the former president claiming the country was now experiencing "Marxism or Communism."

"What's going on is sick," Trump said. "And what they do is they're unbelievable at cheating on elections. With you, I don't have to worry about saying that because, you know, if you say that on Fox, they want to cut you out.

"They cheated on elections," Trump went on. "Had Rupert Murdoch backed his people, he wouldn't have had any liability. When he went out and said 'There was nothing wrong with this election' - what a thing to say."

Newsweek has reached out to Fox via email for comment.

Murdoch, who is chairman of Fox Corp., testified under oath that the 2020 presidential election was "not stolen" and agreed that the election had been "free and fair."

That testimony came as part of Dominion Voting Systems' $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News where the voting machine company alleged that Fox had harmed its businesses by spreading false claims about its machines helping to rig the 2020 election in favor of President Joe Biden.

Fox reached a last-minute settlement with Dominion that meant an impending trial on the matter did not take place.

Elsewhere in the interview with Bannon, Trump again criticized mail-in ballots and alleged that the COVID-19 pandemic had been used to steal the 2020 election.

"They used COVID to cheat," Trump said. "They used COVID to cheat with all these mail-in ballots." He went on to suggest that the U.S. should "get rid of mail-in ballots."

The former president also told Bannon that President Biden's age was not a major problem.

"When they talk about Biden being old, he's not old," Trump said. "I have friends that are 85, 90, 93 - you look at Bernie Marcus, he's 100 percent and he's 94, 95. Biden's not old, that's not his problem. He's got other problems but he doesn't have [an] old problem."

Billionaire Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus, the founder of the conservative advocacy group Job Creators Network, is 93.