Steve Bannon’s trial on border wall fraud charges delayed until February

By Darren Lyn

HOUSTON, US (AA) - Steve Bannon, a former White House adviser during Donald Trump's first presidential term, had his state border wall criminal fraud trial postponed by a New York judge on Monday.

Bannon is facing numerous charges from the Manhattan District Attorney's Office for allegedly defrauding donors who believed they were giving money to build Trump's border wall between the US and Mexico.

The staunch Trump ally had pleaded not guilty to the charges and his trial was scheduled for Dec. 9, but at a court hearing Monday, Judge April Newbauer reset the court date to Feb. 25 after granting a motion to the prosecution to allow additional financial evidence to support their case against Bannon, according to news reports.

Bannon was indicted in September 2022 on charges including money laundering, scheming to defraud and conspiracy.

He was the chairperson for an advisory group for the We Build The Wall Inc. organization, and prosecutors allege that Bannon duped thousands of donors by telling them that all of the money raised would go to build Trump's wall at the southern border and not to the people running the effort to build the wall.

The district attorney's office said Bannon used some of the money to enrich himself and the group's founder, Brian Kolfage. Three other members of the group, including Kolfage, have already been convicted of charges related to the border wall scheme.

In his defense, Bannon claimed that he was targeted for political reasons by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat who prosecuted the criminal hush money case against Trump earlier this year in which he was convicted of 34 counts of illegally making hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and writing them off as business expenses.

Bannon was charged by federal prosecutors in the same border wall scheme in August 2020. He pleaded not guilty to the charges and was later handed a presidential pardon by Trump. However, since this is a state case, presidential pardons are not permitted.

If Bannon is convicted, he faces up to 15 years behind bars. He recently completed a four-month prison sentence for defying subpoenas from the Jan. 6 House Committee related to the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riots.