The Department of Justice filed a motion Monday asking a federal judge to drop the contempt of Congress charges against Steve Bannon — the case that sent the former White House chief strategist to prison for four months. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro signed a one-page motion to dismiss the two-count indictment with prejudice, meaning the charges cannot be brought again.

Simultaneously, Solicitor General D. John Sauer asked the Supreme Court to consider whether Bannon is entitled to relief from his conviction on the grounds that the January 6 committee that subpoenaed him was unlawfully composed.

The twin filings represent the clearest move yet by the Trump DOJ to dismantle what it views as the prior administration's politically motivated prosecution apparatus.

The filings

Pirro's motion, filed in D.C. federal district court before Judge Carl Nichols, was blunt:

The government has determined in its prosecutorial discretion that dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice.

No career prosecutors signed onto the filing. That detail will generate noise from the usual quarters, but prosecutorial discretion belongs to the executive branch — not to career staff who may have been shaped by the very institutional culture the current DOJ is working to correct.

At the Supreme Court, Sauer's brief posed a pointed question to the justices — whether Bannon is entitled to relief based on the argument that the committee was unlawfully composed, even though he never raised that argument before the committee itself. He cited a federal rule of criminal procedure that allows the government to seek dismissal even after a guilty verdict and judgment, The Independent reported.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche framed the action in direct terms:

Today the Department of Justice told the Supreme Court that Steve Bannon's conviction arising from the J6 'Unselect' Committee's improper subpoena should be vacated.

He added:

Under the leadership of Attorney General Bondi, this Department will continue to undo the prior administration's weaponization of the justice system.

What Bannon actually did — and what was done to him

Bannon defied subpoenas from the House January 6 committee, refusing to sit for an interview or provide documents. The House voted to hold him in contempt.

He fought the conviction through every available channel. Federal judges denied his requests to stay out of prison pending appeal. The conviction was upheld on appeal. He was transferred to a low-security federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, and served his full four-month sentence, concluding in October 2024.

Before reporting to prison, Bannon went on his War Room broadcast and said what his critics never expected him to say:

I am proud to go to prison. This is what it takes to stand up to tyranny.

He called himself a political prisoner. The establishment scoffed. The DOJ's Monday filing suggests he may have had a point.

The committee question that won't go away

The central legal argument now before the Supreme Court is whether the January 6 committee was lawfully constituted. Sauer's filing drives straight at this issue. If the committee's composition was unlawful, then its subpoenas carried no legitimate authority — and contempt charges built on illegitimate subpoenas are a house built on sand.

This is not a minor procedural technicality. It goes to the heart of whether Congress can construct politically curated investigative bodies, staff them with members selected for maximum partisan impact, and then wield the criminal justice system against anyone who refuses to participate in the production.

President Trump has been direct about his view of the committee's conduct, posting on Truth Social that the committee should face criminal prosecution and demanding accountability for the handling of their records. The committee's defenders insist everything was above board. The Supreme Court will now have the opportunity to weigh in.

A pattern, not an anomaly

Bannon's case doesn't exist in isolation. Former Trump aide Peter Navarro similarly refused to comply with a committee subpoena, was found in contempt, and served his own four-month prison sentence. The DOJ has now dropped its defense of Navarro's conviction as well, with a federal appeals court set to decide whether that conviction can be overturned.

The through-line is unmistakable. The prior administration used the investigative and prosecutorial machinery of the federal government to pursue allies of a political opponent. The targets weren't random — they were chosen for proximity to Trump and visibility in conservative media. Bannon and Navarro went to prison. The architects of the committee that sent them there face no consequences at all.

That asymmetry is the story.

Prosecutorial discretion cuts both ways

Critics will frame Monday's filings as the DOJ doing favors for the president's friends. They will ignore that prosecutorial discretion is a core executive function — one that the Biden DOJ exercised constantly, including in its choices about whom to charge, whom to ignore, and which investigations to pursue with vigor versus which to let quietly expire.

The question isn't whether the DOJ has the authority to seek dismissal of charges it believes were improperly brought. It plainly does. Sauer's filing cited the federal rule that permits exactly this — even after conviction and judgment. The question is whether the original prosecution served justice or served politics. The current DOJ has answered that question clearly.

Judge Nichols will rule on Pirro's motion. The Supreme Court will decide whether to take up Sauer's question about the committee's legitimacy. The legal process will play out.

But Steve Bannon already served his time. He went to prison, paid his fine, and came out the other side. Whatever the courts decide now, those four months don't come back. The system extracted its pound of flesh first and asked whether it had the right to do so later.

That sequence tells you everything about how the previous DOJ operated — act first, justify never.