The well-known US right-wing populist and former presidential adviser Steve Bannon has been found guilty of contempt of Congress. A jury in Washington on Friday found former President Donald Trump's former chief strategist guilty. According to information from the broadcaster NPR, the sentence for the 68-year-old is expected to be announced on October 21. Bannon faces a prison sentence of between 30 days and a year. However, according to the Washington Post, no one has been imprisoned for contempt of Congress since the Cold War. A fine is also possible.
The former Trump adviser had ignored a subpoena from the parliamentary inquiry into the Capitol storming on January 6, 2021. He also refused to hand over documents. Bannon's lawyer had argued in vain in the trial, which only began on Monday in federal court, that his client did not knowingly resist the subpoena. Rather, the date of the survey was "the subject of ongoing discussions".
The investigative committee is working on the events surrounding the storming of the seat of the US Parliament. Trump attacked the body on Friday in a message on his online network Truth Social as a "mock court" and accused it of being "corrupt and highly partisan".
The committee considers Bannon to be a key witness to the events of January 6, 2021. According to the committee, the right-wing populist spoke to Trump the day before the storming. In his own podcast at the time, Bannon also predicted that "hell will break out". Radical Trump supporters then stormed Congress when the election victory of Trump's challenger Joe Biden was to be officially confirmed.
Bannon had been a central figure in Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. After his election victory, Bannon became chief strategist in the White House. Trump fired him in August 2017.
