Steve Bannon agrees to testify before Jan. 6 committee [Video]

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Steve Bannon agreed to testify publicly before the Jan. 6 House select committee after former President Trump waived executive privilege,
• The former Trump advisor had been charged with two charges of contempt of Congress last year for refusing to cooperate with the investigation.
• Bannon was adhering to the assertion of executive privilege at the time, according to his lawyer.

Steve Bannon informed the Jan. 6 House select committee on Saturday that he is now willing to testify publicly after former President Donald Trump waived executive privilege, according to reports.

“President Trump has decided that it would be in the best interests of the American people to waive executive privilege for Stephen K. Bannon, to allow Mr. Bannon to comply with the subpoena issued by your Committee,” Bannon’s attorney, Robert Costello, wrote in the letter to Jan. 6 Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson. “Mr. Bannon is willing to, and indeed prefers, to testify at your public hearing.”

For months, Bannon had refused to cooperate with the committee investigating the Jan.6 Capitol attack. His refusal led to two charges for contempt of Congress last year. The trial for those two counts is set to begin later in July, but Bannon wants to delay it until the fall. 

Trump wrote Bannon a letter on Saturday to inform him that he would waive the executive privilege. 

“When you first received the subpoena to testify and provide documents, I invoked executive privilege. However, I watched how unfairly you and others have been treated, having to spend vast amounts of money on legal fees and all of the trauma you must be going through for the love of your country and out of respect for the office of the president,” Trump wrote. 

“Therefore, if you reach an agreement on a time and place for your testimony, I will waive executive privilege for you, which allows for you to go in and testify truthfully and fairly, as per the request of the unselect committee of political thugs and hacks.”

Though the setting off Bannon’s potential testimony is undetermined, he said he is open to a closed-door interview. The long-time Trump ally is also willing to provide the panel with documents that were subpoenaed last year, according to The Guardian, which first reported the news on Sunday. 

In 2017, Trump fired Bannon from his role as a White House strategist. The Jan. 6 committee argued that Bannon’s claim of executive privilege is groundless since he was a private citizen at the time of the Capitol attack in 2021. 

Source: Yahoo! News