(Online Desk)

US President Donald Trump unleashed a spectacular denunciation of one of his closest political allies Wednesday, describing his former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon as insane and irrelevant.

"Steve Bannon has nothing to do with me or my presidency. When he was fired, he not only lost his job, he lost his mind," Trump said in a statement that was notably abrasive, even for America's combative 45th president. 

Trump said Bannon  -- who engineered the New York real estate mogul's link to the nationalist far right and helped create a pro-Trump media ecosystem -- was "only in it for himself."