Steve Bannon, the former influential adviser to then President Donald Trump, refused to comply with subpoenas for documents and testimony related to the Jan 6 2021 insurrection on the Capitol.
A federal criminal trial is set to begin today to determine whether Bannon broke the law by refusing to comply with a subpoena.
Last fall the special congressional committee investigating Jan 6 Capitol riots subpoenaed Bannon to sit for a deposition and for hun to provide documents related to the riots. Bannon refuses to comply.
The house committee then in October 2021 cited him for contempt and referred him to the Department of Justice for prosecution.
The department of justice pursued the referral. In November, a federal grand jury indicted Bannon on two counts of contempt of Congress, both misdemeanors.
It is extremely rare for the justice department to pursue charges such as these. The last time something like this was pursued and there was a contempt prosecution was in 1983.
If he is convicted Bannon faces between 30 days and one year in prison for each charge.
Bannon was fired by Trump from the White House in August 2017. He emerged as a powerful conservative voice ever since then. His podcast called War Room is popular among conservatives. He uses his podcast to stoke conspiracy theories, all of which are baseless and proven false, about the 2020 election. He also outlines how Trump could overturn the presidential election starting in September 2020.
The committee said in its contempt report that Bannon appeared to have “some foreknowledge” of what would happen on Jan 6.
It also said that Bannon spoke with Trump twice on the day prior.
During one of the calls, Bannon said to Trump “all hell is going to break loose tomorrow.”
“It’s all converging and now we’re on the point of attack tomorrow,” Bannon said.
In the lead-up to the riots, Bannon was part of Trump’s core team. He was present at the Willard hotel which was the nucleus of Trump’s legal efforts to overturn the election.
The trial today makes Bannon the first former Trump official to face a criminal trial for refusing to participate in the Jan 6 investigation.
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