Steve Bannon will stand trial next May over his alleged involvement in a $15 million border-wall fundraising scam, a Manhattan judge said Thursday — as the former strategist to ex-President Donald Trump appeared in court.
Bannon, 69, — who has blasted the criminal case as being politically motivated — must face trial on May 27, 2024, just two months after Trump’s own fraud trial is set to begin in the same courthouse before the same judge.
After the brief hearing Thursday in Manhattan Supreme Court — where Bannon appeared wearing a black coat, black shirt and grey pants — he told reporters “We’ll see you back here in May.”
Bannon also confirmed that he’d be backing Trump, 76, in the upcoming presidential election.
“I endorsed President Trump already,” Bannon said on his way out of court.
Bannon and other organizers of the “We Build the Wall” campaign — a fundraiser to help build a wall on the US-Mexico border — were accused of lying to potential donors by claiming president and US Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage wouldn’t take in a salary.
Kolfage — a triple amputee from a 2004 Iraq bombing — actually raked in an over $250,000 salary, $140,000 of which Bannon allegedly laundered, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and New York Attorney General Letitia James have alleged.
Trump issued a presidential pardon to Bannon in January 2021 for the alleged crime but the pardon only covers federal cases and doesn’t apply to the state charges he was hit with.
Kolfage was sentenced in the federal case against him to more than four years in prison in April for embezzling $350,000 in donations.
Bannon has pleaded not guilty to charges of money laundering, conspiracy and scheming to defraud investors. If convicted, he’d face a maximum five-to-15-year prison sentence in the charity fraud case.