Steve Bannon’s criminal trial in Manhattan was supposed to be over before his former boss was back in the White House, but a judge on Monday pushed it back more than two months — positioning the case to play out during the pivotal first 100 days of Donald Trump’s incoming administration.
Bannon is now scheduled to be on trial starting Feb. 25, as the Manhattan district attorney’s office seeks to hold him accountable over his role in “We Build the Wall,” an effort to construct a privately funded border wall during the first Trump administration that ended up bilking donors. A federal case sentenced two Bannon associates, Brian Kolfage and Andrew Badolato, to prison for years. But Bannon narrowly escaped a federal trial by receiving a pardon from Trump during the president’s final hours at the White House.
Trump can’t kill the Bannon case this time because it’s in state court. However, the new timing of the trial means that the right-wing media figure will now have a close ally running the federal government while it plays out. And on the flip side, the details released during Bannon’s trial could serve as one of the first scandals involving Trump’s inner circle.