'Humiliated' media should 'shut up'

Donald Trump's senior adviser Steve Bannon said the media should "keep its mouth shut" after being "humiliated" by a surprising election outcome.

"The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for awhile," Bannon told the New York Times.

"I want you to quote this," Mr Bannon added.

"The media here is the opposition party. They don't understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States."

He said the media got the election "dead wrong".

His comments come off the back of press secretary Sean Spicer's angry rant at the media on Saturday, blaming them for accurately reporting Trump's relatively small inauguration crowd size.

Trump's senior adviser, Kellyanne Conway, defended her colleague and said Spicer had just provided reporters with "alternative facts".

In a heated interview with NBC, Conway said the government "might have to rethink its relationship with the press".

Trump, during his first official stop at the CIA headquarters, said he had a "war" with the media, labeling them as the "most dishonest people" he had ever met.

He has called BuzzFeed "a failing pile of garbage", CNN is "fake news", and ranted against Vanity Fair for giving his restaurant a bad review.

Some analysts see a deliberate strategy of delegitimizing the press, in order to curtail future scrutiny of the new administration.