President Trump's former chief strategist Stephen Bannon, who was arrested over the summer for alleged fraud, has lost his lawyer after suggesting that Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray should be beheaded.
Lawyer William Burck on Friday "abruptly moved to drop" Bannon as a client after the former Trump strategist suggested violence against Fauci and Wray, The New York Times reports. Burck reportedly did not provide an explanation as to why he was doing so. A judge will have to approve change, the Times notes.
"Mr. Bannon is in the process of retaining new counsel," a letter to the court reportedly said.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The move came after Bannon said during his online show that Trump should fire Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Wray, director of the FBI, at the start of a second term should he win re-election, and then suggested he would like both to be killed.
"I'd actually like to go back to the old times of Tudor England," Bannon said. "I'd put the heads on pikes. Right? I'd put them at the two corners of the White House as a warning to federal bureaucrats. You either get with the program or you're gone."
Twitter has also permanently suspended Bannon's show's account over the remarks, while YouTube removed a video of the comments for violating its policy against "inciting violence," CNN reports.
Bannon was arrested and hit with charges in August for allegedly defrauding donors to an online "Build the Wall" fundraising campaign. He has pleaded not guilty.
Fauci has spoken out about receiving death threats against him and his family during the COVID-19 pandemic, telling 60 Minutes in October that the "very fact that a public health message to save lives triggers such venom and animosity to me that it results in real and credible threats to my life and my safety" is "sad."
-
5 museum-grade cartoons about Trump's Smithsonian purgeCartoons Artists take on institutional rebranding, exhibit interpretation, and more
-
Settling the West Bank: a death knell for a Palestine state?In the Spotlight The reality on the ground is that the annexation of the West Bank is all but a done deal
-
Codeword: August 23, 2025The Week's daily codeword puzzle
-
ABC News to pay $15M in Trump defamation suitSpeed Read The lawsuit stemmed from George Stephanopoulos' on-air assertion that Trump was found liable for raping writer E. Jean Carroll
-
Judge blocks Louisiana 10 Commandments lawSpeed Read U.S. District Judge John deGravelles ruled that a law ordering schools to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms was unconstitutional
-
ATF finalizes rule to close 'gun show loophole'Speed Read Biden moves to expand background checks for gun buyers
-
Hong Kong passes tough new security lawSpeed Read It will allow the government to further suppress all forms of dissent
-
France enshrines abortion rights in constitutionspeed read It became the first country to make abortion a constitutional right
-
Texas executes man despite contested evidenceSpeed Read Texas rejected calls for a rehearing of Ivan Cantu's case amid recanted testimony and allegations of suppressed exculpatory evidence
-
Supreme Court wary of state social media regulationsSpeed Read A majority of justices appeared skeptical that Texas and Florida were lawfully protecting the free speech rights of users
-
Greece legalizes same-sex marriageSpeed Read Greece becomes the first Orthodox Christian country to enshrine marriage equality in law
