OAN’s Brooke Mallory
1:03 PM – Friday, May 10, 2024
Former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon sought to overturn his contempt of Congress conviction on Friday, but a federal appeals court rejected his bid.
advertisement
The court upheld Bannon’s punishment for failing to respond to a Jan. 6 subpoena.th The committee has now been disbanded.
“There is no dispute that Mr. Bannon first raised these claims in district court, long after the deadline to respond to the subpoena had passed,” Judge Brad Garcia wrote in the Columbia Special. This was stated in a letter to a three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the Circuit.
“A witness cannot defend contempt of Congress based on affirmative defenses that he could have raised at the time he was ordered to produce documents or appear in court, but failed.”
In 2022, Mr. Bannon was convicted of failing to appear at a committee-ordered deposition and withholding documents subpoenaed by the committee. He was sentenced to four months in prison and a $6,500 fine.
The ruling is the latest in a series of defeats for Bannon and former Trump aide Peter Navarro, who ignored subpoenas issued by the committee.
Before Navarro was told to report to a Florida prison to serve his four-month term, the Supreme Court intervened and refused to grant his request for emergency relief.
“The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in Mr. Navarro’s case generally upheld the lower court’s decision that Mr. Navarro’s appeal did not raise “substantial questions of law” and therefore did not justify his release. .” the hill report.
A federal appeals court ruled that for Navarro’s executive privilege claim to raise a meaningful issue, former President Trump needed to invoke it, but the court ruled that it “didn’t happen here.” ”.
Mr. Bannon still has the option of asking the Supreme Court to consider his case or asking the entire appellate court to consider it, which could potentially reduce his sentence.
In his appeal of his conviction, Mr. Bannon asked the court to reevaluate the legal standard for determining intentionality, saying that despite his inability to produce documents or attend depositions, Mr. He pointed out that he had consulted a lawyer.
Stay informed. Receive breaking news directly to your inbox for free. Subscribe here. https://www.oann.com/alerts
Please share this post!
