Steve Bannon is smart. He has an MBA from Harvard Business School. He has a master’s degree in national security from Georgetown University. He has been an investment banker and held high positions in numerous companies.
He developed a strategy to get Trump elected, focusing on very emotional issues likely to get Republicans pumped up enough to vote for Trump. About a third of Americans don’t vote.
One theme was that the elites in Washington don’t care about working families. And of course that illegal Mexicans are taking jobs from good Americans, so we need to build a really high wall. And Trump added a twist, in that it wasn’t going to cost taxpayers a cent as Mexico was going to build it for us. Trump said this repeatedly, with intense conviction.
In addition to being smart, Bannon is corrupt. He is a grifter. Trump fired him as the Chief Strategist in the White House in August 2017. After this, Bannon was involved in many conservative organizations and was even a consultant to President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil and his son.
I have no idea what advice Bannon gave to Bolsonaro, but after losing the Brazilian election on October 31, 2022, he did not concede the election and cast doubt whether the election machines accurately recorded the votes. There was no evidence of faulty election machines, and the federal electoral court on June 30, 2023 barred Bolsonaro from running for president until 2030 for discrediting the election process:
Bannon promoted the “We Build the Wall” movement. The idea was that if Democrats in Congress would not fund Trump’s wall, then Steve Bannon and other Republicans would. A total of 25 million dollars was raised.
It was a scam. Some of the money was used, but the organizers were taking substantial sums for their own personal use. The donors were die-hard conservatives, who would without a second thought, send money to help build the wall. The organization was ripping off Trump’s MAGA supporters.
In August 2020, Steve Bannon was arrested on board the Lady May, owned by Guo Wengui, a billionaire and one of the top 10 on China’s most wanted list. We will get to Guo Wengui in Part 2 of this blog. Also a bit about the Lady May. It is no longer owned by Mr. Wengui.
Based on evidence presented to a grand jury, Bannon and three others were indicted on defrauding donors. The three others are Andrew Badolato, Brian Kolfage and Timothy Shea. Badolato and Kolfage pled guilty and have been sentenced to 36 and 51 months on April 26, 2023. Shea pled not guilty and was sentenced to 63 months in prison on July 25, 2023.
Southern District of New York Colorado Man Sentenced To Prison For “We Build The Wall” Online Fundraising Fraud Scheme, July 25, 2023
Steve Bannon was able to avoid a trial because Trump gave him a pardon on his last day in office. This didn’t work. While charges were dropped in Federal Court, Manhattan DA, Alvin Bragg charged Bannon with money laundering, conspiracy and scheming to defraud donors on September 8, 2022.
Prior to his pardon, he was accused of stealing over one million dollars. Per the link below, “if convicted on the top charge, he faces a maximum 5 to 15 years in prison, according to Bragg.”
Politico, Steve Bannon charged with money laundering, conspiracy
Given Shea conviction, there is no chance of a plea bargain. It is expected to go to trial in 2024.
Bannon has been convicted for a failure to appear at the Jan 6 Congressional Hearing on October 21, 2022 and has been sentenced to four months in jail and pay a fine of $6500. He was allowed to be free on bond until the appeals are complete.
The link below gives more details of Steve Bannon. Per the link below, ‘In his memoir, White House senior adviser Jared Kushner recalled having an abrasive relationship with Bannon and two occasions in which Bannon threatened him, including one in which he threatened to ‘break Kushner in half’ after he accused Bannon of leaking to the press.[272][273] Also in his memoir Kushner writes “Bannon single-handedly caused more problems for me than anyone else in my time in Washington. He probably leaked and lied about me more than everyone else combined. He played dirty and dragged me into the mud of the Russia investigation”.’
Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Bannon
So, Donald Trump and Steve Bannon will be in Manhattan to face charges in 2024. Trump is facing criminal charges on the Stormy Daniels Hush Money case and Bannon on the Build the Wall fraud scheme.
What was going through Trump’s head when he pardoned Bannon, knowing he ripped off his followers and leaked lies about his son in law to the press. I can only believe that Bannon had a lot of ammunition to use against Trump.
Part 2 will be shorter, as I will discuss the fall of Guo Wengui, a close associate of Steve Bannon.
Stay tuned,
Dave
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