A D.C. jury has convicted Donald Trump’s former top adviser Stephen Bannon of two counts of contempt of Congress.
The verdict comes after Bannon defied a subpoena to answer questions from the Democrat-led committee that is investigating the Capitol riot, according to The New York Times. The Department of Justice (DOJ) had charged him with two counts of contempt of Congress, to which he had pleaded not guilty.
“I only have one disappointment,” he told reporters on Friday. “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.”
WATCH:
Steve Bannon addresses reporters after he was found guilty of contempt of Congress:
"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." pic.twitter.com/S2lN8a70Dl
— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 22, 2022
Bannon, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Daily Wire, is the first close aide of the former president to be convicted as a result of the investigations into the January 6 events. He faces between 30 days to a year in prison for each of the charges.
Former Trump adviser Peter Navarro is also charged with contempt for defying the committee’s subpoena, according to the Times, and he will go to trial in November.
“This is a man who didn’t show up,” DOJ prosecutor Molly Gaston told jurors Friday morning, Fox News reported.
“He didn’t want to recognize Congress’ authority or play by the government’s rules,” Gaston added. “Our government only works if people show up and play by the rules and are held accountable when they do not.”
“When he chose to defy a congressional subpoena, that was a crime,” the DOJ prosecutor continued. “The defendant chose allegiance to Donald Trump over compliance with the law.”
Bannon’s lawyers argued that he had legitimate reasons for not showing up and that the court had barred these explanations.
“Mr. Bannon has a full story for why he didn’t show up — his advice of counsel, the invocation of executive privilege, questions about its validity and so on,” attorney David I. Schoen argued before the trial began, the Times reported. “All of these defenses and his story of the case have been barred by the court at the government’s request.”
His defense also told jurors that “the entire foundation of the government’s case rests” on January 6 Committee staffer Kristen Amerling’s testimony. Attorney Evan Corcoran urged the jurors to consider “whether a witness has a friendship or hostility towards anybody connected with the case,” Fox News reported.
“She’s been doing committee work for Democrats for 20 years,” Corcoran said of Amerling. “She has a relationship with one of the prosecutors on the case, Mrs. Gaston. It goes back 15 years. She’s contributed her own money to Democratic causes.”
The attorney also said that Amerling and Gaston are members of the same book club, the publication reported.
“Prosecution has to be based on unbiased neutral evidence, politics can play no role, and Steve Bannon is innocent,” he said.