AP Photo/ Evan Vucci
- Steve Bannon is doubling down on rejecting January 6 Committee subpoenas.
- Attorney Robert J. Costello sent another letter on Wednesday saying that his client will not comply.
- Trump’s legal team instructed the president’s former aides not to comply with the subpoenas.
Steve Bannon’s defense team sent another letter to the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the US Capitol, maintaining that he and other Trump allies will not produce documents for subpoenas due to the former president’s alleged executive privileges, according to ABC News.
“Mr. Bannon’s position is not in defiance of your Committee’s subpoena; rather, Mr. Bannon noted that President Trump’s counsel stated that they were invoking executive and other privileges and therefore directed us not to produce documents or give testimony that might reveal information President Trump’s counsel seeks to legally protect,” Bannon’s attorney, Robert J. Costello, wrote.
-John Santucci (@Santucci) October 13, 2021
It is the second letter from Bannon’s team addressed to January 6 Committee Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson saying that the former Trump adviser will not comply.
In early October, Trump’s legal team instructed the president’s former aides, including Bannon, not to comply with the congressional subpoenas issued in September.
At the time, the committee also requested documents from former Trump administration officials Mark Meadows, Dan Scavino, and Kash Patel. The subpoenas asked Bannon and Patel to sit for depositions on October 14 and for Meadows and Scavino to sit the next day, and all have rejected those prospects.
At odds is whether Trump as a former president can invoke executive privilege to defy the subpoenas in this context. President Joe Biden, the current executive, has waived executive privilege and asked for the documents to be sent to the committee.
On Wednesday, according to NBC News, the White House’s counsel asked the National Archives to quickly turn over Trump-related documents to the January 6 committee.
“The President further instructs you to provide those pages 30 days after your notification to the former President, absent any intervening court order,” the message said, according to NBC News.
Rep. Liz Cheney said on Tuesday that the committee is prepared to bring criminal contempt charges to anyone who ducks the subpoenas.
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