Steve Bannon, a previous advisor and confidant to former President Donald Trump, has been ordered to serve a four-month prison sentence for contempt of Congress after refuting a subpoena from the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 riot on the Capitol, according to CNN. Bannon, 68, must also pay a $6,500 fine.
The Justice Department had sought a six-month sentence and a fine of $200,000.
“For his sustained, bad-faith contempt of Congress, the Defendant should be sentenced to six months’ imprisonment — the top end of the Sentencing Guidelines’ range—and fined $200,000 — based on his insistence on paying the maximum fine rather than cooperate with the Probation Office’s routine pre-sentencing financial investigation,” federal prosecutors wrote in their court filing.
Federal prosecutors added that the rioters who stormed the Capitol on January 6 not only ambushed the Capitol, but “assaulted the rule of law upon which this country was built and through which it endures.” They also said Bannon made the attack worse by “flouting the Select Committee’s subpoena and its authority,” and pointed out how Bannon referred to House Select Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-MS) as “gutless.”
Bannon further targeted those he considered political enemies via his conspiracy theory-touting podcast and defied all cooperation requests from the January 6 committee.
After his indictment last year, Bannon told reporters, “this is going to be the misdemeanor from hell for Merrick Garland, Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden.” On trial in July, however, he was quickly found guilty on two counts of contempt.
Per Federal District Judge Carl Nichols, Bannon will remain free pending the appeal of his conviction.
