New York – Page 3 – Deep Left Field

Already facing a two-year prison term in federal prison after being found guilty for contempt of Congress, Steve Bannon, a former political strategist for failed ex-president Donald Trump, will surrender to New York authorities on Thursday for his role in an alleged scheme to defraud contributors to a $25 million fundraising effort for building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

According to The Washington Post:

The precise details of the state case could not be confirmed Tuesday evening. But people familiar with the situation, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sealed indictment, suggested the prosecution will likely mirror aspects of the federal case in which Bannon was pardoned.
In that indictment, prosecutors alleged that Bannon and several others defrauded contributors to a private, $25 million fundraising effort, called “We Build the Wall,” taking funds that donors were told would support construction of a barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Shortly after news broke of the latest indictment against Bannon, he lashed out in statement which reads in part, “The Soros-backed DA has now decided to pursue phony charges against me 60 days before the midterm election because WarRoom is the major source of the MAGA grassroots movement. The SDNY did the exact same thing in August 2020 to try to take me out of the election. It didn’t work then, it certainly won’t work now.”

Full statement from Steve Bannon on WaPo report Bannon will surrender to NY prosecutors: pic.twitter.com/ipsySFdQzb
— Kristen Welker (@kwelkernbc) September 7, 2022

Ironically, Bannon was pardoned by Trump on federal charges connected to the “We Build the Wall” fundraising scheme, but that pardon doesn’t protect him from being indicted and put on trial in New York. Bannon pleaded not guilty to those charges, which included allegations that he had personally pocketed $1 million of the donated funds.

Bannon may also be in further legal jeopardy for his role in the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol. His name has come up frequently during the public hearings being conducted by the House Select Committee investigating Jan. 6.

Here’s more on Bannon’s contempt of Congress conviction:

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has written extensively about failed, one-term former President Donald Trump said Saturday on MSNBC that the ex-president is about to be indicted in New York on charges of racketeering.

According to David Kay Johnston, the charges will come from the office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr., who has been investigating Trump for allegedly misleading lenders and tax officials about the real value of his properties.

Johnston told host Yasmin Vossoughian:

“I anticipate they’re going to bring a racketeering charge against Trump. Certainly Trump’s team, when he’s indicted, and I’m certain he will be indicted, is going to try to lay the blame on everybody else, and so what the prosecutors want to show that is if (Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer) Allen Weisselberg phonied up documents, it was at the direction of Donald Trump.”

Vossoughian asked if Johnston was certain about his reporting, to which he replied:

“Oh, yeah. They would not have done all of this and know how much they know … if they weren’t going to to do this. Yeah, they will indict him. Exactly when? I don’t know. I don’t expect it will be on a straight tax charge. I think there will be a tax charge, but the key charge will be racketeering.”

Johnston also laid out what will happen once an indictment is handed down against Trump:

“Once he’s indicted, Trump will have to surrender himself to be booked. I’m sure he will be released on his own recognizance, and then we will see a campaign of trying to delay trial. You will see Donald say, ‘This is corrupt, the prosecutors are corrupt, the police are corrupt, the auditors are corrupt,’ because that’s what Roy Cohn taught him when he was a young man — accuse law enforcement, and then delay, delay, delay.”