Trump ally appears on contempt charges
Longtime Trump ally Steve Bannon appeared before a judge on Monday to face criminal contempt charges for defying a subpoena from Congress’ Jan. 6 committee, then declared combatively outside court that he was “taking on the Biden regime” in fighting the charges.
Bannon did not enter a plea and is due back in court on Thursday for the next phase of what could be the first high-level trial in connection with January’s insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Combative outside court, he said he was “going on the offense” against the attorney general, the speaker of the House and President Biden. He declared, “This is going to be a misdemeanor from hell for Merrick Garland,
Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden.”
The 67-year-old Bannon surrendered earlier in the day to FBI agents. He was indicted on Friday on two federal counts of criminal contempt — one for refusing to appear for a congressional deposition and the other for refusing to provide documents in response to the committee’s subpoena.
Federal Magistrate Judge Robin Meriweather released him without bail but required him to check in weekly with court officials and ordered him to surrender his passport. If convicted, Bannon faces a minimum of 30 days and a maximum of one year behind bars on each count, prosecutors said.
Outside the courthouse, a large inflatable rat made to look like Republican former President Donald Trump was on the sidewalk as a crowd waited for Bannon to leave. Some in the crowd shouted expletives at him and called him a traitor, and one man paraded around with a sign that read: “Clowns are not above the law.”
The indictment came as a second expected witness, former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, defied a separate subpoena from the committee on Friday.
If the House votes to hold Meadows in contempt, that recommendation would also be sent to the Justice Department for a possible indictment.
Meadows was Trump’s top aide at the end of his presidency and was one of several people who pressured state officials to try and overturn the results of the 2020 election won by Democrat Biden. Bannon promoted the Jan. 6 protests on his podcast after predicting the day before that “all hell is going to break loose.”