Feds: Lock Up Bannon for 6 Months

Prosecutors issue sentencing recommendation for contempt of Congress
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 17, 2022 9:30 AM CDT
Feds: Lock Up Bannon for 6 Months
Steve Bannon appears in Manhattan Supreme Court on Oct. 4. In that case, he's accused of defrauding donors who gave money to build a wall on the US southern border.   (Curtis Means/Daily Mail via AP, Pool)

Steve Bannon defiantly blew off a subpoena from the Jan. 6 House committee. Now federal prosecutors say he should go to prison for six months as a penalty. The Justice Department on Monday issued its sentencing recommendation for the Donald Trump ally, who was found guilty of contempt of Congress earlier this year, reports Politico. Bannon, who refused to testify before the panel or hand over requested documents related to Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election, will be sentenced on Friday, per NBC News.

Bannon "flouted the Committee's authority and ignored the subpoena's demands," write the prosecutors. "To this day the Defendant has not produced a single document to the Committee or appeared for testimony." At one point, Bannon did agree to testify, but his "effort to exact a quid pro quo with the Committee to persuade the Department of Justice to delay trial and dismiss the charges against him should leave no doubt that his contempt was deliberate and continues to this day," the prosecutors wrote, per Politico.

During his contempt trial, Bannon didn't testify, but he made a point to publicly criticize members of the Jan. 6 committee outside the DC courthouse. "I only have one disappointment, and that is the gutless members of that show trial committee—the J6 committee—didn't have the guts to come down here and testify in open court," Bannon said at the time, per Insider. (Bannon also is facing legal trouble over donations he solicited to build a wall at the border.)

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