Peter Navarro, who worked as a trade adviser in the Trump White House, defied a subpoena to testify before the House Jan. 6 committee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
WASHINGTON \u2014 The Justice Department wants former Trump White House adviser Peter Navarro to spend six months behind bars after being convicted of criminal contempt\u2002<\/a>of Congress for ignoring a subpoena.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Federal prosecutors said in a court filing Thursday that Navarro \u201cdeserves severe punishment\u201d that includes a $200,000 fine in addition to prison time. He is scheduled to be sentenced Jan 25.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Navarro, 74, was found guilty<\/a> last year on two counts of contempt after he rejected a congressional subpoena to testify before the now-defunct Jan. 6 committee and provide relevant documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe Defendant chose allegiance to former President Donald Trump over the rule of law,\u201d prosecutors wrote in Thursday\u2019s sentencing memo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe cloaked his bad-faith strategy of defiance and contempt behind baseless, unfounded invocations of executive privilege and immunity that could not and would never apply to his situation,\u201d they added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Navarro\u2019s attorney Stanley Woodward declined to comment on the Justice Department\u2019s sentencing request.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Navarro has said that he ignored the congressional subpoena because Trump told him to invoke executive privilege, an argument that was later rejected by prosecutors<\/a> and a judge<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a separate court filing Thursday, Navarro\u2019s attorneys asked that the court not sentence him to more than six months probation and to pay a $200 fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDespite the government\u2019s effort to label Dr. Navarro as an insurrectionist, the reality is that his conviction arises solely from a conviction for his refusal to comply with the Select Committee\u2019s subpoena and has nothing to do with the events that occurred at the Capitol on January 6, 2021,\u201d Navarro\u2019s lawyers wrote in their filing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Navarro isn\u2019t the first former Trump adviser to face the possibility of imprisonment after defying a Jan. 6 committee subpoena. In 2022, Steve Bannon was sentenced to four months<\/a> behind bars plus a $6,500 fine \u2014 prosecutors had sought six months in prison and a $200,000 fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n