(GoRealNewsNow.com) – Former high-ranking Trump White House official Peter Navarro has been found guilty of contempt of Congress for ignoring a subpoena by the Democrat-led House Select Committee on the January 6, 2021, events at the US Capitol.
In the Trump administration, Navarro served as the Assistant to the President, the head of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, and the national policy coordinator for the Defense Production Act.
A jury in the courtroom of US Judge Amit Mehta of the US District Court for the District of Columbia convicted Navarro on two misdemeanor counts of contempt of Congress after Judge Mehta previously ruled against the defendant’s claim of executive privilege in his refusal to testify before the House committee.
Navarro became the second Trump official convicted on contempt charges after refusing to cooperate with the House Select Committee, The Daily Caller notes in a report.
The first was former White House adviser Steve Bannon, who was sentenced to four months in prison for defying a subpoena related to the January 6, 2021, investigation.
Each of the two misdemeanors of which Navarro was found guilty carries up to a year in prison. Mehta scheduled his sentencing for January 2024.
“Peter Navarro made a choice. He chose not to abide by the congressional subpoena,” prosecutor Elizabeth Aloi said during the trial, as cited by AP.
“The defendant chose allegiance to former President Donald Trump over compliance to the subpoena,” Aloi added.
She argued Navarro could have produced the documents demanded by the House Democrats while stating which ones he thought warranted executive privilege.
“The day that judge made it ruled that I could not use executive privilege as a defense in this case, the die was cast. This was pro forma. We knew, going in, what the verdict was gonna be. That’s why this is going to the appeals court. This is going to the Supreme Court,” Navarro reacted after the ruling.
“I said at the beginning I am willing to go to prison to settle this issue. I am willing to do that. But I also know that the likelihood of me going to prison is relatively small because we are right on this issue,” he declared.