Baltimore Sun

Bannon pleads not guilty to fraud-related charges

Trump ally alleged to have siphoned off border wall cash

- By Michael R. Sisak

NEW YORK — Former President Donald Trump’s longtime ally Steve Bannon pleaded not guilty Thursday to duping donors who gave money to build a wall on the U.S. southern border — a state-level reboot of a federal case that ended with a presidenti­al pardon last year.

Bannon, 68, was released without bail after his arraignmen­t on charges including money laundering, conspiracy and fraud related to the “We Build the Wall” campaign. He is the second person pardoned by Trump and later charged by the Manhattan district attorney’s office for the same alleged conduct.

“It’s all nonsense. They will never shut me up,” Bannon said as he left court.

Manhattan prosecutor­s say that while Bannon promised all donations would go to building the wall, he was involved in transferri­ng hundreds of thousands of dollars to third-party entities and used them to funnel payments to two other people involved in the scheme.

The indictment didn’t identify those people by name, but the details match those of Brian Kolfage and Andrew Badolato, who pleaded guilty to federal charges in April.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said that after Bannon was pardoned, Manhattan prosecutor­s decided to hold him accountabl­e because the alleged scheme ripped off hundreds of Manhattan residents.

“The simple truth is: It is a crime to profit off the backs of donors by making false pretenses,” Bragg said at a news conference.

Bannon’s New York charges stem from the same alleged conduct as an attempted federal prosecutio­n that ended abruptly, before trial, when Trump pardoned Bannon on his last day in office. Manhattan prosecutor­s also charged WeBuildThe­Wall, Inc., the nonprofit entity that Bannon and his former co-defendants used to solicit donations. The company pleaded not guilty Thursday.

Presidenti­al pardons apply only to federal crimes, not state offenses. Last year, the Manhattan district attorney’s office charged Ken Kurson, a friend of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, with cyberstalk­ing months after Trump pardoned him in a similar federal case.

Like Bannon, Kurson was pardoned early in his federal case, before acquittal or conviction, negating any double jeopardy argument.

Bannon accused Bragg of pursuing “phony charges” against him, saying the Democratic prosecutor targeted him ahead of November’s midterm elections because he and his radio show are popular among Trump’s Republican supporters.

But New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office worked with Manhattan prosecutor­s on the case, said it was about holding “powerful political interests” to account.

“They think they are above the law. And the most egregious of them take advantage of hardworkin­g Americans in the process,” said James, a Democrat.

In 2020, federal agents pulled Bannon from a luxury yacht off the Connecticu­t coast and arrested him on charges he pocketed more than $1 million in donations

to the wall-building effort. In all, more than $25 million was raised, prosecutor­s said.

In that case, federal prosecutor­s alleged Bannon and his co-defendants tricked thousands of people into thinking 100% of their donations would go to building a wall along the 1,933-mile U.S.-Mexico border.

Instead, according to federal prosecutor­s, Bannon used some of the money to pay personal expenses for himself and a secret salary to Kolfage, a “We Build the Wall” co-founder.

“All the money you give

goes to building the wall,” Bannon told donors at a June 2019 fundraisin­g event, according to the New York indictment unsealed Thursday. Kolfage, who is not charged in the state case, repeatedly pledged: “I won’t take a penny from these donations, not a penny,” the indictment said.

Bannon, who had pleaded not guilty to the federal charges, was dropped from the federal case when Trump pardoned him.

Kolfage, a U.S. Air Force veteran who lost both legs in a mortar attack in Iraq, and

Badolato, a Florida financier, had been scheduled to be sentenced this week, but that was recently postponed to December. A third defendant’s trial ended in a mistrial in June after jurors said they could not reach a unanimous verdict.

In another case not covered by Trump’s pardon, Bannon was convicted in July on contempt charges for defying a congressio­nal subpoena from the House committee investigat­ing the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrecti­on at the U.S. Capitol. He is set to be sentenced in October.

 ?? STEVEN HIRSCH/NEW YORK POST ?? Former White House strategist Steve Bannon, center, is escorted Thursday into the courtroom in Manhattan State Supreme Court to be arraigned.
STEVEN HIRSCH/NEW YORK POST Former White House strategist Steve Bannon, center, is escorted Thursday into the courtroom in Manhattan State Supreme Court to be arraigned.

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