Newly leaked audio puts Steve Bannon’s downfall in a whole new light
Sometimes you just have to admit you’re stumped. For instance, just a day ago I seemed to have it all figured out when it came to what the DOJ is doing with Steve Bannon. Given that his court trial starts this coming Monday, it seems pretty clear at this point that the DOJ is going ahead and trying Bannon on just the two contempt charges for now, and is not bringing any superseding charges against Bannon ahead of trial.
What are the odds that more serious charges are coming against Bannon eventually? Even he seems certain it’s going to happen, given that he’s been using his court proceedings in the contempt case to try to force the DOJ to show the rest of its hand against him, so he can get a jump on what else is coming. Bannon’s effort failed, and this ultra-secret DOJ has succeeded in leaving Bannon heading into trial while in the dark about what he’s facing on the other side of it. That may indeed be the entire strategy.
If the DOJ can get an easy conviction against Bannon for contempt this month, and get him sentenced to prison – a place he’s clearly skittish about going – then it gains all the leverage. Bannon would then have to consider cutting a cooperating plea deal against Donald Trump as his only way of avoiding prison. And if Bannon does decide to suck it up and serve the contempt sentence, the DOJ could then hit him with the more serious charges while he’s in prison – making it a lot more difficult for him to go on his podcast each day and muddy the waters.
But then on Tuesday, just after Bannon’s pretrial motions were shot down and the trial was locked in to start within days, someone leaked an audio recording of Bannon privately bragging well before election day that Donald Trump was planning to falsely declare victory even if he lost badly. The detail with which Bannon’s pre-election bragging lines up with Trump’s post-election actions suggests that Bannon and Trump were indeed plotting this together every step of the way – and if so it means that Trump decided to commit his election crimes even before he knew whether he was going to win or lose.
This is precisely the kind of evidence that will help nail Bannon on more serious election-related criminal charges. Of course, given that this evience links Bannon and Trump in a criminal conspiracy together, it would be tricky for the DOJ to indict Bannon for election crimes at this time, without also indicting Trump for election crimes at this time. And since the DOJ clearly isn’t ready to indict Trump yet, it may be holding off on the additional Bannon charges until it’s ready to also charge Trump.
That brings us to the question of why this audio leaked on Tuesday, and who leaked it. To be clear, secret recordings don’t get picked up off someone’s desk by the wind and randomly land on a reporter’s desk. Someone was in possession of this audio, and chose right now to leak it. Why not leak it months ago? Why not next month? Why leak it on the eve of Bannon going on trial for a lesser charge?
That raises the secondary question of whether the DOJ already had this audio recording. Has the person in possession of this recording been keeping it to himself or herself all this time, and just now decided to leak it to the media? Did the possessor of this recording give it to the DOJ awhile ago, and frustrated that Bannon hasn’t yet been indicted for election crimes ahead of his contempt trial, is now leaking it to the media out of impatience?
On the other hand, is it possible that the DOJ itself leaked this recording to the media, in order to signal to Bannon ahead of his trial that he really is screwed and he should just cut a cooperation deal now? It would be one way to send that message to Bannon without having to prematurely bring additional charges against him. The Garland DOJ never seems to leak anything by accident, but it does appear to be periodically feeding strategic details to the media in order to steer things in a certain direction.
The truth is we just don’t know for sure what’s going on here. Is Steve Bannon even capable of realizing he’s lost and that he needs to cut a cooperation deal? Will he be able to grasp that even if he’s convicted and sentenced to prison? Bannon is a guy who always thinks he’s going to win, no matter how badly he’s losing, and it often ends up costing him spectacularly over the years. We’ll see. The DOJ holds all the cards here. It’s just a matter of making Bannon realize his hand is empty, so he’ll fold and flip on Trump instead of continuing to drag things out as his losses mount.
