Among the many reasons Bannon cited was why his case should be dismissed: He said the congressional summons he received was invalid due to the composition of the House of Representatives committee investigating the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. Bannon also claims that his actions were necessary to protect the former president’s ability to protect information according to claims to executive privilege, and insisted that he was relied on previous guidelines from the Ministry of Justice regarding the privilege of the executive to oppose the subpoena of Congress.
“In the circumstances presented here, it would be fundamentally unfair and a clear breach of due process to allow this prosecution to continue,” Bannon’s lawyers wrote in a late court file Friday. “It must be rejected.”
Bannon is due to stand trial in July in a criminal case for contempt of Congress filed by the Department of Justice against him for failing to comply with a January 6 summons to a House of Representatives committee. He pleaded not guilty.
Bannon’s legal team has repeatedly cited indications that Trump wanted to uphold executive privilege on certain records as part of Bannon’s defense.
“Mr Bannon has been given real power in this case for his failure to comply with the summons directly from former President Trump’s call for executive privilege and the corresponding directive to Mr Bannon that Mr Bannon must respect that reference with regard to the summons. ”Bannon’s lawyers wrote in the court file.
Bannon’s deposit on Friday comes after he suffered a major setback in a lawsuit filed by the Justice Department in November after failing to comply with a January 6 summons issued by the panel.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols ruled last week that Bannon could not use as evidence – if his case is heard – evidence that he had followed his lawyer’s advice in choosing not to cooperate with the House of Representatives investigation.
On Friday, the Justice Department tried to further limit the evidence Bannon could present at the trial in its defense, asking Bannon’s judge to rule out three new categories of evidence.
The Department of Justice wants to exclude its internal opinions and writings outlining the department’s views on whether current or former federal officials can be prosecuted in subpoena disputes in which they have sued for privilege or immunity of the executive. Bannon received these records after receiving an opening order from a judge, although some of the documents have already been made public and cited in previous Bannon documents.
The Justice Department also claims that Bannon’s documents have so far cited scenarios different from what Bannon faced when he chose not to participate in the investigation.
“The defendant was not summoned in connection with the time he was an executive officer and was never directed by the executive or former President Donald Trump to participate in complete non-compliance with the January 6 summons of the elected committee (” committee “), because he chose to do”, the document says. “Given the inappropriateness of the evidence, the Court must exclude it.”
Bannon was a White House adviser at the beginning of the Trump administration, but was outside the federal government years before the House of Representatives committee.
Shortly after the Department of Justice filed a motion to exclude these records, Bannon cited the documents in a notice he filed with the court about his intentions to insist on protection from “estoppel seizure” – meaning an argument that the defendant was misled by statements of the government to consider his conduct lawful.
In his request for dismissal, Bannon said that the previous guidelines of the Ministry of Justice were relevant to his case and should offer grounds for dismissal.
“The legal authority on which Mr Bannon relies in this case reflects the official, official, binding, authoritative position of the Department of Justice, the agency itself, which is prosecuting this case in direct violation of its own official, binding, published official policy.” , write Bannon’s lawyers.
The Justice Department also asked the judge to keep any evidence Bannon wanted to present that he had complied with previous subpoenas; according to a report from the department’s presentation to Bannon’s lawyer before prosecutors before his client was indicted, Bannon testified in four previous circumstances – in various investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election – into communicating with Trump.
“Just as the fact that one person did not rob a bank in one day is irrelevant in determining whether he robbed a bank in another, whether the defendant complied with other subpoenas or requests for testimony – even those involving communication with the former president.” “It is irrelevant to determine whether he has unlawfully refused to comply with the Committee’s summons here,” the Justice Ministry said on Friday.
Finally, the government told the court that Bannon should not be able to claim in the lawsuit against him that the commission’s January 6 summons to him was invalid due to alleged procedural defects affecting the panel.
All the procedural objections that Bannon would like to raise regarding the summons of the commission come too late, the Ministry of Justice argued in its request from Friday to limit this protection.
“In the context of contempt of Congress, a law has been established that a summoned witness who fails to raise an obvious objection or privilege against a subpoena before the extradition committee has waived it as a defense for contempt,” the government said in court records.
Bannon, meanwhile, filed a lawsuit Friday, excluding evidence the government received from summonses it issued in his lawyer’s phone and email records, as well as presentations the lawyer gave to prosecutors before Bannon be accused.
Bannon accused the government of “excessive prosecution work” for seeking information about his lawyer and said the government had misled the grand jury, both grounds for dismissal, Bannon’s lawyers said in a lawsuit.
Pre-trial disputes over evidence will outline the case of each party.
Bannon is just one of four disobedient witnesses the commission has referred to the Justice Department since January 6, but he is the only one to face criminal charges for failing to comply with the commission’s summons. How his case unfolds will be echoed as other potential witnesses decide whether to cooperate with the Congressional investigation or not.
This story and title have been updated.
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