Former top Trump aide Steve Bannon will not testify in his own defense during his criminal contempt of Congress trial

According to his lawyer David Schoen, former top Trump strategist Steve Bannon will not speak for himself in court on Thursday during his criminal contempt of Congress case.

Schoen informed Judge Carl Nichols that no evidence will be presented to the jury by the defense side.

Bannon is facing two counts of criminal contempt of Congress after allegedly refusing to comply with a subpoena for documents and testimony issued by the House Select Committee looking into the attack on the Capitol on January 6.

Bannon served as the former President Donald Trump’s chief White House strategist and was the CEO of his first presidential campaign.

After nearly two days of testimony, during which the prosecution accused Bannon of thinking he was “above the law” and “thumping his nose” at congressional requests, Bannon decided not to testify.

The Jan. 6 committee’s chief attorney told the jury on Wednesday that it is “very unusual” for witnesses to blatantly refuse to comply with a congressional subpoena, as Bannon did, and that the committee considered referring Bannon to the Justice Department for criminal contempt of Congress to be a “very serious step.”

Bannon insisted at the time of his refusal that he could not testify due to concerns raised by the former president regarding executive privilege.

However, Amerling claimed that the committee never received notice of these concerns from Trump, and that the committee would not have accepted such a claim in any case.

Bannon abruptly changed his position last week, telling the Jan. 6 committee that he’s willing to appear in public after his lawyer, Robert Costello, claimed that Trump had reneged on his claims of executive privilege.

The prosecution attempted to block Bannon’s defense team from questioning Amerling about his change of heart and bringing it as evidence for the jury to consider, but in court on Wednesday, Bannon’s attorneys persuaded Nichols to grant them permission.

Bannon is not guilty of knowingly disobeying the Congressional order, according to the defense, since he believed discussions regarding the viability of Trump’s executive privilege claim were ongoing and flexible.

Bannon has entered a not guilty plea to both accusations and, if found guilty, could spend up to a year in jail on each count.