Bookstore owner calls police after customer confronted Steve Bannon

A Richmond, Va., bookstore owner said he called the police on Saturday after former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon was confronted in his store.

Nick Cooke, owner of Black Swan Books, told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that a woman called Bannon a “piece of trash.”

The woman then left the store after Cooke said he called 911.

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“Steve Bannon was simply standing, looking at books, minding his own business. I asked her to leave, and she wouldn’t. And I said, ‘I’m going to call the police if you don’t,’ and I went to call the police and she left,” Cooke said. “And that’s the end of the story.”

Bannon grew up in Richmond, the newspaper noted.

The Richmond Police Department confirmed the call was made but the call was canceled before officers responded.

“We are a bookshop. Bookshops are all about ideas and tolerating different opinions and not about verbally assaulting somebody, which is what was happening,” Cooke said.

Bannon joins a growing list of political figures associated with President Trump who have been confronted in public in recent weeks.

Protesters in Kentucky followed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to his car while he was leaving a Louisville restaurant on Saturday, threatening to vote him out of office.

Others, including White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, also have been confronted by protesters for their association with the Trump administration and its policies.