Steve Bannon begins serving 4-month sentence in federal prison for defying congressional subpoena

CNN —

Steve Bannon, a former Donald Trump White House strategist, reported to a federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, on Monday to begin a four-month sentence for defying a congressional subpoena.

Bannon, the second former Trump aide to be imprisoned for a contempt of Congress conviction after Peter Navarro began serving a four-month sentence earlier this year, was taken into custody shortly after 12 p.m. ET.

He was driven into the federal prison in a black van after speaking at a podium outside the correctional facility, saying he was “proud” to go to prison.

“It’s time for me to surrender up in Danbury,” he said.

Both Bannon and Navarro were convicted for not complying with subpoenas issued to them by the now-defunct House Select Committee that investigated January 6, 2021. The Supreme Court on Friday denied a long-shot effort by Bannon to avoid reporting to prison while he challenges his conviction before the federal appeals court in Washington, DC.

Bannon has said that he was not thumbing his nose at the House committee but rather relying on advice from his attorneys to not respond to the subpoena until lawmakers worked out Trump’s claims of executive privilege in the matter. Courts did not allow him to argue that to the jury that decided his case.

The conservative podcaster has remained a staunch Trump ally and is a vocal supporter of his presidential reelection bid.

In an interview aired Monday morning, the former president reacted to Bannon reporting to prison, saying, “(President Joe) Biden is going to pay a big price for it.”

“They wanted to silence him, but they’ll never silence him, but they wanted to silence him. Oh, this is pure weaponization. What they’ve done in this country is