Supreme Court Clears Path for DOJ to Erase Bannon Conviction

The US Supreme Court cleared the way for the Trump administration to wipe out conservative activist Stephen Bannon’s criminal conviction for defying a congressional subpoena.

Acting on a joint request by Bannon and the Justice Department, the justices set aside a federal appeals court decision that upheld his conviction, which led to a four-month prison term. The move sends the case back to a trial judge in Washington to consider US Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s request to dismiss the indictment.

Pirro wrote in her Feb. 9 motion that “the government has determined in its prosecutorial discretion that dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice.” Federal judges generally have little authority to overrule the Justice Department’s decision to withdraw charges while a case is active.

Bannon, an ally and former adviser of President Donald Trump, was found guilty of contempt of Congress in 2022 for failing to cooperate with a House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol.

Although Bannon served his time in 2024, his case remained open as he appealed the jury’s guilty verdict. He lost before a federal appeals court in Washington and filed an appeal with the Supreme Court in October.

The Supreme Court case is Bannon v. United States, 25-453.

--With assistance from Zoe Tillman and Jimmy Jenkins.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Elizabeth Wasserman at ewasserman2@bloomberg.net

Steve Stroth

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