(NEW YORK) — Steve Bannon, a onetime political adviser to former President Donald Trump, has been charged by authorities in New York with defrauding donors to the “We Build the Wall” fundraising campaign for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Bannon surrendered Thursday in Manhattan.

He spoke to reporters after arriving to turn himself in, saying the charges were “all about 60 days to the election.”

“This is an irony, on the very day the mayor of this city has a delegation down on the border, they are persecuting people here who try to stop them on the border,” Bannon said, referring to a fact-finding delegation New York City Mayor Eric Adams has sent to Texas following the decision by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to bus migrants to New York.

The indictment charges Bannon and “We Build the Wall” itself with two counts of money laundering, which carries a maximum sentence of five to 15 years in prison. There are additional felony counts of conspiracy and scheme to defraud along with one misdemeanor count of conspiracy to defraud.

The state charges, brought by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, resemble federal charges for which Bannon received a pardon by Trump, and allege that Bannon and “We Build the Wall” defrauded 430 Manhattan-based donors out of $33,600. Across New York state, there were more than 11,000 donors defrauded out of more than $730,000, according to the indictment.

The pardon only applied to the federal case and does not preclude the state charges.

“Mr. Bannon took advantage of his donors’ political views to secure millions of dollars which he then misappropriated. Mr. Bannon lied to his donors to enrich himself and his friend,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office participated in the investigation, said in a statement.

“It is a crime to turn a profit by lying to donors, and in New York, you will be held accountable,” added Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. “As alleged, Stephen Bannon acted as the architect of a multi-million dollar scheme to defraud thousands of donors across the country — including hundreds of Manhattan residents.”

Two Florida men, an Air Force veteran and a venture capitalist, indicted with Bannon in the federal case, pleaded guilty in April in connection with their role in the alleged scheme to defraud “We Build the Wall” donors.

Brian Kolfage and Andrew Badolato were charged in the scheme with Bannon. A fourth defendant, Timothy Shea, stood trial that ended with a mistrial.

Kolfage and Badolato are not named in the state indictment, but are referenced as co-conspirators 1 and 2, a sign they could have assisted Manhattan prosecutors build their case against Bannon.

The quartet allegedly bilked donors to “We Build the Wall” and used some of the $25 million raised on personal expenses, including a luxury SUV, a golf cart and cosmetic surgery, the federal indictment said.

“The defendants defrauded hundreds of thousands of donors, capitalizing on their interest in funding a border wall to raise millions of dollars, under the false pretense that all of that money would be spent on construction,” then-U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss said when the charges were announced in 2020.

“My sole intent was to raise funds and donate those funds to the federal government,” Kolfage told the judge.

“And you promised that 100% of the money would be used to build that wall? Is that right?” Judge Analisa Torres asked.

“Yes, your honor,” Kolfage replied.

“After keeping that large sum of money for yourself, you did not tell the IRS you received the money. Is that right?” Torres asked.

“Yes, your honor,” Kolfage answered.

Bannon’s surrender Thursday makes him the third defendant pardoned by Trump to subsequently face charges brought by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

Paul Manafort, Trump’s one-time campaign boss, was charged with running a two-year scheme to obtain more than $19 million in residential mortgage loans based on fraudulent representations to various banks. The New York Court of Appeals ultimately threw out the case, deeming it too similar to Manafort’s federal conviction and therefore double jeopardy.

In the state case against Bannon, double jeopardy is not expected to apply because a jury was never convened to weigh the federal fraud charges over “We Build the Wall.”

Ken Kurson, a former editor of the New York Observer, associate of Jared Kushner and speechwriter for Rudy Giuliani, was pardoned by Trump in a federal cyberstalking case. Kurson eventually pleaded guilty to two state-level misdemeanors that accused him of spying on his former wife’s computer.

Kurson is due back in court next week so the judge can make sure he’s complying with his community service.

Trump pardoned Kurson during his final moments in office, but then-Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance announced an indictment seven months later that charged Kurson with eavesdropping and computer trespass.

Kurson, in 2015, surreptitiously installed spyware on his ex-wife’s computer from his work computer at the Observer in 2015, according to the indictment.

“We will not accept presidential pardons as get-out-of-jail-free cards for the well-connected in New York,” Vance said in a statement at the time the charges against Kurson were announced in 2021.

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(WASHINGTON) — A state judge in New Mexico has removed a county commissioner from office after ruling that — because he participated in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — the U.S. Constitution barred him for engaging in an “insurrection.”

It is the first time an elected official directly associated with the attack has been disqualified from serving in public office on those grounds.

New Mexico District Court Judge Francis Mathew barred Otero County commissioner and “Cowboys for Trump” founder Couy Griffin, citing a clause in the 14th Amendment that prohibits those who have engaged in insurrection from serving — the only time in 150 years that the provision has been used to disqualify an official and the first time that a court has ruled the events of Jan. 6 were an “insurrection.”

Griffin “incited, encouraged and helped normalize the violence,” Mathew wrote, calling his actions “overt acts in support of the insurrection.”

Some constitutional experts have suggested the section of the law — despite unsuccessful attempts to invoke the same provision against GOP members of Congress and other Trump-backed candidates earlier this year — may have wide-ranging implications, especially for former President Donald Trump if he runs again for the White House.

“Just the fact that this has happened one time, if it stands up on appeal, makes the future challenges more credible than if no one had ever been disqualified for their participation in January 6 … Up until now it seemed like more of a hypothetical,” said Gerard Magliocca, a constitutional scholar at Indiana University who has studied Section 3 of the The Reconstruction-era amendment.

“If Griffin is disqualified, then it’s a little hard to see why Trump wouldn’t be disqualified,” he added.

Known as the “Disqualification Clause,” the provision bars any person from holding federal office who has previously taken an oath to protect the Constitution — including a member of Congress — who has “engaged in insurrection” against the United States or “given aid or comfort” to its “enemies.”

“Griffin, as an Otero County Commissioner since January 2019, took an oath to “support and uphold the Constitution and laws of the State of New Mexico, and the Constitution of the United States,” Matthew wrote in his opinion.

Convicted earlier this year for trespassing on U.S. Capitol grounds, Griffin refused to certify the state’s primary election results in Otero County in June. He’s now banned from holding any future state or federal elected positions, Mathew ruled.

“You know, they’re, they’re trying to get all of this legal framework in place, because they’re gonna use it against President Trump,” said Griffin in early July during an Otero County Commission special session, where he presented a motion for the county to pay his legal expenses in the lawsuit.

“We can make a stand right here, we can make a stand on a county level. We could fight back,” he said.

During the meeting, Griffin said that he hadn’t gotten any help from Trump-related groups or the former president himself.

“I’m disappointed in President Trump as well. I’m disappointed that I don’t have any more support from their side … it really feels like I’ve been fed to the wolves and along in a lot of ways,” he said.

The decision came in a lawsuit brought by a group of New Mexico residents represented by the government accountability group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and other lawyers.

“This is a historic win for accountability for the January 6th insurrection and the efforts to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power in the United States. Protecting American democracy means ensuring those who violate their oaths to the Constitution are held responsible,” CREW President Noah Bookbinder said in a statement. “This decision makes clear that any current or former public officials who took an oath to defend the U.S. Constitution and then participated in the January 6th insurrection can and will be removed and barred from government service for their actions.”

The last time elected officials were disqualified from office using the constitutional clause appears to be after the Civil War in 1869, according to CREW, after the ratification of the 14th Amendment.

Similar constitutional arguments have been made, but have failed to persuade judges in Georgia and North Carolina, against GOP Reps. Marjorie Taylor-Greene and Madison Cawthorn. The latter’s case was ultimately halted after he lost in the primary contest for his reelection bid.

Magliocca, a constitutional scholar at Indiana University and who testified at Greene’s hearing, noted that the challenge to Griffin — compared to those against Greene and Cawthorn — may have succeeded because he was a local official.

“Another difference is Mr. Griffin was an official, not a candidate … so that’s simpler. Because, you know, you’re not dealing with an election, you’re not dealing with a, you know, some very short deadline that you need to make a decision by,” said Magliocca.

“But also, the other thing is, in some instances, you can say that the participation that can be proved for one individual versus another is greater or less. And I think, in Mr. Griffin’s case, the court found a lot of facts,” he said.

Tuesday’s ruling is a test case for inevitable challenges to Trump’s ballot eligibility if he plans to make another White House bid, retired Harvard Law professor and constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe told ABC News, which he said may be more effective in keeping him out of office than by means of legal prosecution.

“It’s in response to an extraordinary event, which we hope won’t be repeated. I think it shows that there is an alternative path to holding people accountable besides a criminal prosecution,” said Tribe.

Still, one of the most significant aspects of Tuesday’s decision is that it declares formally that what happened Jan. 6 was an insurrection within the meaning of the Constitution, according to Tribe and Magliocca.

“It’s a wake-up call. I mean, it’s not that the courts needed this opinion in order to read the Constitution, we can all read it. But now, there’s an example. It’s really the difference between something that may be a dead letter and something that has actually been resurrected and used successfully,” Tribe said.

“And I think that’s going to encourage people in other contexts to invoke the Fourteenth. It would be premature for anybody to predict that this is the beginning of the end for everyone who was involved in trying to overturn the 2020 election, but it’s certainly a start,” he added.

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