Judge Orders Steve Bannon To Report To Prison By July 1 To Serve His Contempt Of Congress Sentence

Federal Judge Carl Nichols has ordered former Trump adviser Steve Bannon to report to prison by July 1 to serve his four-month contempt of Congress sentence.

In July 2022, Bannon was found guilty on two counts of contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over documents to the House Select Committee on the Jan. 6 Attack after being subpoenaed. 

He had been sentenced in October 2022 to four months behind bars, the same sentence that another ex-Trump adviser, Peter Navarro, who also declined to comply with a Jan. 6 Committee subpoena, is now serving.

“The defendant chose allegiance to Donald Trump over compliance with the law,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Molly Gaston told jurors during closing arguments in 2022.

Bannon’s sentence had been put on hold pending appeal, and his lawyers made their case to a three-judge federal appeals court panel in November 2023. 

In May, however, a Washington D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel unanimously denied several challenges the ex-Trump adviser made to the case.

Federal prosecutors filed a motion asking Nichols to order Bannon to report to prison. After the appeals court denied the appeal, federal prosecutors told him there was “no legal basis” for the continued stay of the sentence.

The judge stated on Thursday that he did not believe that the “original basis” for his stay of the burden of Bannon’s sentence existed any longer after an appeals court upheld his conviction. 

Bannon could still appeal Nichols’ ruling that he needs to report to prison.

The judge concluded that he had the authority to lift the hold on the defendant’s sentence, even while an appeal of conviction would proceed.

Bannon’s lawyers asserted that the sentence should be stayed until they appeal it to the full appeals court and the Supreme Court. 

Bannon smiled while going through security to enter the courthouse Thursday morning. 

A person nearby said, “Trump ’24!” to him, and the defendant smiled and shook his hand.

After the judge made his decision, Bannon looked calm and kept smiling. 

His lawyer, David Schoen, sprung into action, becoming much more lively than he had been during the rest of the hearing as he tried once more to convince Nichols to let Bannon remain out of prison.

During the hearing, Schoen argued that his client should be able to stay out of prison until the Supreme Court weighs in on the case. 

He also mentioned that he would file his request for the full D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the case by June 24.

Prosecutor John Crabb said Bannon did not satisfy the legal threshold for staying out of prison while his appeal proceeded. 

“One thing you have to learn as a lawyer is that when the judge has made his decision, you don’t stand up and start yelling,” Nichols stated.

While Schoen protested, the judge said he “had enough.”

“I’m not yelling,” Schoen responded.

He stated that he was “passionate.”

“You’re sending a man to prison who thought he was complying with the law; we don’t do that in my system,” Schoen stated.

The attorney called the judge’s decision “contrary to our system of justice.”

“I think you should sit down,” Nichols replied. 

Shortly after the hearing ended, Bannon promised to fight his contempt of Congress conviction “all the way to the Supreme Court if we have to.”

He also argued without proof that his prosecution by the Justice Department was about “shutting down the MAGA movement, shutting down grassroots conservatives, shutting down President Trump.”

“There’s nothing that can shut me up and nothing that will shut me up,” he said to the reporters outside the federal courthouse in Washington. “There’s not a prison built or a jail built that will ever shut me up.”

“We’re going to win at the Supreme Court,” Bannon declared.

With a less than a month until the surrender date, the ex-adviser could attempt to file emergency motions with the appeals court and even the Supreme Court hoping to push off his sentence longer.

On May 11, 2023, Bannon’s Washington, D.C. home was swatted again during his show Bannon’s War Room broadcast. Police and rescue workers replied to a shooting call at his house in the morning.

The incident happened after an interview with Rep. Nancy Mace (R-South Carolina). At the end of the interview, the noise was heard in the background as the ex-adviser went on a commercial break.