Stephen K. Bannon, a staunch ally of former President Donald J. Trump, must report to federal prison on Monday after the Supreme Court rejected his latest attempt to throw out a four-month prison sentence for contempt of Congress.
In a decision Friday, the court denied Mr. Bannon’s request to remain free while he challenges his conviction on charges of defying a subpoena from the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol dated January 6, 2021. Mr. Bannon had filed a last-ditch petition last week with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., asking for permission to delay the surrender to authorities.
In July 2022, Mr. Bannon was found guilty at a trial in Washington of ignoring the subpoena seeking information about his role in the events of January 6. Although he was sentenced to four months in prison, he was initially allowed to remain free while he conducted a lengthy appeal process.
But last month, a federal appeals court upheld his contempt of court conviction, and within weeks the judge hearing his case, Carl J. Nichols, ordered him to begin serving his sentence.
In their petition to Judge Roberts, Mr. Bannon’s lawyers said that if he were forced to report to prison next week, he would almost certainly serve his entire sentence before he could ask the full Supreme Court to hear his appeal of his guilty verdict. The court’s current term ends on Monday, and Mr. Bannon is not expected to be released until just before the November election.
CNN reported this month that Mr. Bannon would serve his sentence in a low-security federal prison in Danbury, Conn. A lawyer for Mr. Bannon did not respond to requests for comment.
Mr. Bannon is likely to remain in custody even as he faces trial in Manhattan in a separate case in which he is accused of misusing money he helped raise for a group backing Mr. Trump’s efforts to to build a wall on the southern border. .
That trial is expected to begin later this year, in the same court where Trump was convicted of falsifying corporate records to cover up a sex scandal that threatened his presidential bid in 2016.
Mr. Bannon becomes the second former adviser to Mr. Trump to be jailed for failing to comply with a subpoena issued by the committee on Jan. 6. Peter Navarro, who advised Mr. Trump on trade issues, is nearing the end of his own four-month sentence in a federal prison in Miami.
The House panel wanted to question Mr. Bannon and Mr. Navarro about their efforts to work with Republican members of Congress to challenge the Jan. 6 election results. The committee members also wanted to question Mr. Bannon about comments he made on his podcast, “War Room,” on January 5, 2021, in which he said “all hell would break loose” the next day.
But Mr. Bannon ignored the committee’s requests, and the House of Representatives found him guilty of contempt of court in October 2021. Nearly a year later, when prosecutors brought him to trial, he tried to defend himself by blaming his lawyer for advising him to ignore the committee.
