Steve Bannon set to go on trial in NYC for Trump border wall scam
NEW YORK — Steve Bannon is set to go on trial for his alleged role in a
scam that saw Trump supporters fleeced of their donations toward a southern border wall in December — about a month after he gets out of federal prison, a Manhattan judge ruled Tuesday.
The right-wing political operative and longtime Trump adviser is currently serving a four-month federal prison sentence following his 2022 conviction in Washington, D.C., for refusing to comply with a subpoena from the House committee probing the Jan. 6 insurrection of the Capitol.
In his unrelated Manhattan case, Bannon, 70, is accused of taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from Trump supporters donated toward building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and funneling it to a since-convicted accomplice, despite publicly claiming “all the money” would be spent on the wall’s construction.
At a brief hearing, prosecutors from the Manhattan district attorney’s office, who brought the case against Bannon and the nonprofit “We Build the Wall” in September 2022, told state Supreme Court Judge April Newbauer they expect testimony will take around four days. Bannon’s lawyers said their case would take two days. Newbauer said she’ll rule on Bannon’s outstanding motion to dismiss the case next month.
Bannon, whose appearance was excused, faces a significantly longer prison term than the one he’s currently serving if convicted on the top count, which carries up to 15 years. He’s
expected to be released from a federal facility in Danbury, Connecticut, on Halloween, about a month before the Dec. 9 trial and less than a week before the presidential election.
Trump pardoned Bannon of similar federal charges hours before leaving office
in an eleventh-hour clemency blitz. He won’t be able to do so again if he wins the election and Bannon is found guilty, as it’s a state case. Three other men who were charged alongside Bannon in 2020, including military veteran Brian Kolfage, did not receive pardons and were all convicted.
Kolfage, to whom the Manhattan DA alleges Bannon funneled more than $100,000, and Andrew Badolato, a longtime Bannon associate,
pleaded guilty to their roles in April 2022 in the federal case. A jury convicted Colorado businessman Timothy Shea
at a retrial the following October after his first ended in chaos with a holdout juror
who alleged a government “witch hunt.”
Kolfage was sentenced to
more than four years in prison, Badolato received a term of around three years, and Shea was sentenced
to just over five years.
Attorneys for Bannon did not speak with reporters after the hearing. A Manhattan DA spokeswoman declined to comment.