Trump aide Steve Bannon must surrender to prison on July 1

Donald Trump’s former adviser and far-right podcaster Steve Bannon must surrender to prison to begin a four-month sentence on July 1 after he defied a subpoena to testify to a congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.

Bannon raged against his sentence after his brief federal court appearance on Thursday while a protester shouted out that he is “going to jail” and labeled him a “coup plotter” outside the courthouse in Washington DC.

“This is about shutting down the MAGA movement, shutting down grassroots conservatives, shutting down President Trump,” Bannon told reporters. “Not only are we winning, we are going to prevail … There is nothing that can shut me up, and nothing that will shut me up.”

Last month, federal prosecutors asked the judge overseeing his case to reverse a stay of his sentence, arguing that “there is no legal basis” to block him from prison after an appeals court upheld his conviction.

On Thursday, Trump-appointed US District Judge Carl Nichols granted that request.

The former White House aide said he will try to take his case to the US Supreme Court.

“There’s not a prison built or jail built that will shut me up,” he said.

Bannon’s four-month prison sentence mirrors the one handed down to former Trump aide Peter Navarro, who also refused to comply with a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack.

Bannon was initially sentenced in October 2022, but the sentence was put on hold pending his appeal. That conviction was upheld last month.

Bannon was found in contempt of Congress in two instances – including refusing to sit for an interview with the January 6 committee, and then refusing to provide documents about his efforts supporting