Uh-Oh: Mueller Serves Steve Bannon With Grand Jury Subpoena In Russia Probe

To be sure, things really didn’t need to get any worse for former White House strategist and current man wondering if any racist blogs are hiring staff writers, Steve Bannon.

When Bannon left 1600 Penn. back in August amid the Charlottesville controversy, Breitbart helped to soften the blow by variously claiming that Steve had been “unleashed” and was thus free to wage “war” on the GOP establishment.

Part of that “war” involved fielding populist firebrands to challenge Republican incumbents in the 2018 midterms. That was going great right up until Bannon’s big win in the Alabama Republican primary turned into a nightmare after Roy Moore was accused of, well, of being a pedophile.

Bannon refused to back down and eventually convinced Trump to throw his support behind Moore (which Trump foolishly did, perhaps because he was jaded about being on the losing side with Luther Strange) only for Roy to end up losing, delivering one of the reddest states in the country to Democrats for the first time in a quarter century.

Perversely (I mean, under normal circumstances, you’d never want to lose Alabama to a Democrat if you’re a Republican, but this time was different), that vindicated Mitch McConnell, whose resignation Bannon had called for just a month earlier. The morning after Moore’s loss, the knives were out with Republicans almost universally calling for Bannon’s head.

Things went from bad to worse when The Guardian published excerpts from Michael Wolff’s “Fire and Fury” in which Bannon is quoted calling the Trump Tower meeting with Natalia Veselnitskaya “treasonous” (among other things). That prompted an angry response from Trump who would go on to alienate Bannon in a hilarious series of statements and tweets that included a new nickname for the President’s former close friend: “Sloppy Steve”.

Then, in the final humiliation, Bannon was forced to leave Breitbart by Rebekah Mercer.

So that’s the kind of month Steve’s had and that’s what we meant here at the outset when we said it probably didn’t need to get any worse. But it did. Because as The New York Times reports, Bannon has been subpoenaed by the special counsel, Robert Mueller, to testify before a grand jury as part of the investigation into possible links between Trump’s associates and Russia.

This is the first time Mueller has used a grand jury subpoena to extract information from a member of Mr. Trump’s inner circle.The news comes as Bannon provides closed-door testimony to the House Intelligence Committee.

Here’s the punchline: the subpoena reportedly came after the excerpts from Wolff’s book were released. Here’s the Times:

The subpoena could be a negotiating tactic. Mr. Mueller is likely to allow Mr. Bannon to forgo the grand jury appearance if he agrees to instead be questioned by investigators in the less formal setting of the special counsel’s offices in Washington, according to the person, who would not be named discussing the case. But it was not clear why Mr. Mueller treated Mr. Bannon differently than the dozen administration officials who were interviewed in the final months of last year and were never served with a subpoena.

Mr. Mueller issued the subpoena after Mr. Bannon was quoted in a new book criticizing Mr. Trump, saying that Donald Trump Jr.’s 2016 meeting with Russians was “treasonous” and predicting that the special counsel investigation would ultimately center on money laundering.

And there you have it. Mueller is going to pounce on Bannon at just the right (or “wrong” depending on how you want to look at it) time.

With Trump having thrown Bannon under the bus without thinking twice, it’s entirely possible that Steve will decide to turn on the President because after all, Trump would do the same to Bannon if the situation were reversed.

Additionally, you can bet this will infuriate Trump, as it suggests Wolff’s book is already doing serious damage.

Exclusive look inside Mueller team strategy meeting when "treasonous" quotes from Wolff book hit last month…https://t.co/RBR85Ri0Zb

— Heisenberg Report (@heisenbergrpt) January 16, 2018

I wonder if the Mueller subpoena uses "Stephen K. Bannon" or "Sloppy Steve"

— Heisenberg Report (@heisenbergrpt) January 16, 2018