Four months in prison for Peter Navarro, former Trump adviser, for refusing to collaborate on the assault on the Capitol

Peter Navarro, former advisor to former US President Donald Trump (2017-2021), has been sentenced this Thursday to four months in prison for refusing to cooperate with Congress in the investigation into the 2021 attack on the Capitol.

The conviction comes after a Washington court found him guilty last September of two counts of contempt for refusing to testify and hand over documents to the House committee investigating the attack.

In addition to the four-month prison sentence, Judge Amit Mehta has ordered Navarro to pay a fine of $9,500. The Prosecution’s Office requested a sentence of six months in prison, accusing him of deliberately refusing to respond to a congressional summons.

Navarro has maintained during the trial that he was protected by the doctrine of “executive privilege,” meaning that certain information cannot be disclosed without Trump’s permission.

On January 6, 2021, a rampage of Trump supporters broke into the Capitol building to unsuccessfully prevent Congress from ratifying Democrat Joe Biden’s electoral victory in the 2020 presidential election. The committee that investigated the attack on the Capitol was created by the then-Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, and in December 2022 concluded that Trump incited the insurrection.

Peter Navarro, who advised Trump on economic policy and the management of the Covid-19 pandemic, was part of the former president’s team that spread false claims that the Republican had won the elections and that Biden’s victory was the result of fraud.

This is the second Republican advisor to be sentenced for non-cooperation with the congressional committee, following Steve Bannon, who was also sentenced to four months but has not yet been imprisoned because he appealed the sentence.