Steve Bannon found guilty of contempt of Congress

US District Judge Carl Nichols adjourned former Trump aide Steve Bannon's trial for jury deliberations at 11:37 a.m. ET.

Bannon is on trial on misdemeanor contempt of Congress charges for failing to comply with subpoenas from the committee.

Rebutting Steve Bannon's defense team's closing argument, prosecutor Amanda Vaughn took aim at the recent offer by the former President Donald Trump aide to testify for the House Select Committee investigating the riot at the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Bannon is on trial on misdemeanor contempt of Congress charges for failing to comply with subpoenas from the committee.

"You know what's really going on there," Vaughn told the jury, noting that Bannon didn't comply for many months and how the offer only came just before his criminal trial.

"He and his friend, former President Trump, suddenly decide he's going to comply? Give me a break!" she said. "Don't be fooled by that."

She told the jury that "the only purpose of those letters is so the defendant could come in" and try to convince the jury "that a deadline is not a deadline."

The letter was "nothing but a ploy. And it's not even a good one," she said, explaining it's because Bannon didn't say he'd provide documents at all.

Steve Bannon's attorney Evan Corcoran veered several times into subjects the court wouldn't allow him to discuss with the jury as he wrapped up his closing argument for Bannon's innocence.

A patter of objections from the Justice Department team that the judge agreed with led to a rocky final few minutes of Bannon's case.

Among other things, Corcoran tried to allude to the politics of the House select committee, which Judge Carl Nichols had ruled had no role in the prosecution of the case.

He suggested maybe Bannon and his attorney made a mistake, before being cut off with an objection from DOJ.

Corcoran then began to speak about listening to a foreign country's news while drinking his morning coffee, hearing about "people in power" trying to "silence the opposition." That too prompted an objection, which the judge agreed with as well.

"We come to our political views honestly ... no one should ... face a criminal prosecution ... based on politics," he then said. Another objection, and more agreement from the judge.

Barely pausing by the end as the objections rolled in, Corcoran ended his speech saying, "politics can play no role."

"It's important we are all in this together, and Steve Bannon is innocent," Corcoran said, his last words to the jury.

After a brief recess taken after the defense's closing arguments, the trial has resumed, and the Justice Department presenting its rebuttal to the defense's closing argument.

Prosecutor Amanda Vaughn is arguing the rebuttal.

Steve Bannon's attorney Evan Corcoran tried his hand at his own metaphor for the jury, after prosecutors minutes earlier compared their congressional contempt case to a parking ticket.

Corcoran's comparison was slightly more tortured: He spoke about the potential bias of the DOJ's primary witness, Kristin Amerling, a House Select Committee staffer who worked on the subpoena and the committee's responses to Bannon, pointing out that she had been in a book club with a prosecutor.

Corcoran explained that if a family had a relative who died and needed to settle the estate, they would bring in a neutral mediator. But if that mediator had been in a book club and known for a long time one of the members of the family, that might raise questions about the neutrality.

"That would make you question whether they're impartial...and that's a reasonable doubt," Corcoran told the jury.

Corcoran is now trying to use another metaphor for his defense argument, but prosecutor Molly Gaston objected, and the court is having another conversation with the legal teams out of earshot of the jury.

Steve Bannon's attorney Evan Corcoran is delivering his closing argument, but his presentation hasn't been as smooth as the government's.

Twice, he has been significantly interrupted by objections from the prosecutors and the judge wanting to have a private conversation with him about the boundaries of what he can say.

Corcoran tried to raise the possibility that the technical procedures of Bannon receiving a valid subpoena weren't followed. At one point, he tried to suggest the subpoena may not have had the "legit" signature of House Select Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson. But prosecutors objected, and after a brief private discussion, Corcoran resumed his presentation, veering to other points.

Bannon's defense team has complained repeatedly throughout the trial that District Judge Carl Nichols has limited his possible defenses too severely for the trial to be fair.

As she neared the end of her closing, prosecutor Molly Gaston described Steve Bannon's conduct as a betrayal to his duties as a citizen, and said that he had "contempt" for the government and for playing by the rules.

Earlier in the remarks, she went over the elements of the crime and pointed to the evidence the government presented that she said satisfied every one of them. She stressed that Bannon's compliance was not a mistake, noting a person who had misunderstood the directions of the subpoena or had not followed it by accident would have "spoken up" when the committee put him on notice for the contempt resolution.

"His belief that he had an excuse not to comply does not matter, that is not a defense to contempt," she said.

She told the jury to not "fall for it" if Bannon's lawyers tried to argue that the subpoena deadlines weren't firm.

"Mr. Corcoran has tried to tell you that this case is about politics," she said, telling the jury that it was Bannon who was trying to make this case about politics and that he was doing that to "distract you."

Praising the jury for their service, she said "we are all participants in shared democracy, but the defendant does not agree.

"He has contempt for our system of government and he does not think he needs to play by its rules," Gaston said. "The defendant chose defiance, find him guilty," she said.

Prosecutor Molly Gaston argued to the jury that Steve Bannon's congressional subpoena is similar to a parking ticket — an analogy that could hit home with the jury of Washington, DC, residents.

She explained that a congressional subpoena works just like a parking ticket you might find on your car. If a person finds one on their windshield, they have two options, she said: Pay it, or try to provide the DC government with a reason arguing against it. If the DC government rejects the excuse, that's it — the parking ticket has to be paid.

"What he doesn't get to do is ignore the order to pay it," Gaston said. If it's not paid, there are consequences, she noted, including the ticket doubling in price.

That's just like Bannon's subpoena, Gaston said, because he had a deadline, the committee rejected his reason, and yet he still didn't respond.

The jury includes several DC and federal government employees, as well as a physician, a former union staffer and an architect.

And DC is a city with many and sometimes complicated parking restrictions — and ticketing is aggressive.

Molly Gaston began the DOJ's closing argument by framing the case as a simple one.

She said that Steve Bannon "did not want to recognize Congress’ authority or play by the government’s rules."

"Our government only works if people show up. It only works if people play by the rules. And it only works if people are held accountable when they do not," she said.