Steve Bannon was found guilty on two counts of contempt of Congress for refusing to provide documentation to the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 insurrection. He was sentenced to four months in prison. When he reported to federal prison in July 2024, Bannon was defiant, stating, “I am proud to go to prison!” before being placed into a black van and driven to the facility.
Bannon had anticipated serving his time in a minimum security “Club Fed,” but instead, he was sent to Danbury in Connecticut. The low-security facility houses violent and sex offenders as well as white-collar criminals, and unlike lower-security institutions, Danbury has a high barrier erected around its boundaries, earning it the ironic nickname “The Wall.”
During intake, inmates undergo a squat and cough strip search and a mental health evaluation before being assigned a bunk and given a bedroll. Hitting the far-right podcaster and MAGA mouthpiece where it really hurts, inmates don’t have internet access. However, they are permitted to send and receive emails without attachments, all of which are monitored, and they are allocated 320 phone minutes each month.
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Bannon’s hard work time
Steve Bannon’s life in prison is tougher than he anticipated. Instead of whiling the hours away at a Club Fed, he’s serving his time at FCI Danbury in Connecticut. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons website, low-security facilities have “double-fenced perimeters, mostly dormitory or cubicle housing, and strong work and program components. The staff-to-inmate ratio in these institutions is higher than in minimum security facilities.” Danbury has a population of 1,177, housed in a mix of dormitories and cubicles. Previous inmates include Rev. Sun Myung Moon and coke kingpin George Jung. The women’s unit, the setting for “Orange is the New Black,” has housed Leona Helmsley, Lauryn Hill, and Teresa Guidice, who said her time in prison was “hell.”
“There was mold in the bathrooms. There was not running water constantly. The showers were freezing cold … I mean, the living conditions were really horrible. Like, horrible,” Guidice told ABC News in February 2016. “There were some nights that we didn’t even have heat.
Former prisoner Ian Bick told Corrections 1 he suspected Bannon would be placed into protective custody because of his celebrity status. “I don’t think anyone’s going to necessarily go off and try and extort him or anything unless he kind of opens that door to being vulnerable,” he said. “If I had to guess, I’m sure the Italian white guys will take a liking to him.”
Bannon’s martyrdom and spiritual quest
Steve Bannon has repeatedly called himself a political prisoner, a line his old boss attempted to exploit, too. Bannon and Donald Trump go way back, so it was hardly surprising that he issued a pardon to his former aide before leaving office in 2021. Trump claimed the MAGA hero was being unfairly persecuted, stating, “Mr. Bannon has been an important leader in the conservative movement and is known for his political acumen” (via CNN). Still, others begged to differ, and it was all bets off after Trump left the White House.
Meanwhile, Bannon insisted that being locked up would only benefit him. “I’m going to be more powerful in prison than I am now,” he told CNN, vowing, “I’m not going to be sitting there going, ‘Oh, woe is me.” Still, Bannon milked his martyrdom to the max before being whisked into the facility. “Father, don’t pray for me; pray for our enemies,” Bannon instructed a priest in the roaring crowd outside of the prison. “They’re the ones that are going to need the prayers.”
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However, it seems that the far-right podcaster isn’t above praying for himself. In June 2024, Bannon told Tucker Carlson he planned to spend his time behind bars engaging in “a lot of spiritual exercises, Saint Ignatius of Loyola, different spiritual exercises that come out of the Catholic Church.”
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