By MARK SHERMAN<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Steve Bannon<\/a>, a longtime ally of President Donald Trump, on Monday won a Supreme Court<\/a> order that is expected to lead to the dismissal of his criminal conviction for refusing to testify to Congress.<\/p>\n Prodded by the Trump administration, the justices threw out an appellate ruling upholding Bannon\u2019s conviction for defying a subpoena from the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by a mob of Trump supporters<\/a> on the U.S. Capitol.<\/p>\n The move frees a trial judge to act on the Republican administration\u2019s pending request to dismiss Bannon\u2019s conviction and indictment \u201cin the interests of justice.\u201d<\/p>\n The dismissal would be largely symbolic. Bannon served a four-month prison term after a jury convicted him of contempt of Congress<\/a> in 2022. A federal appeals court in Washington had upheld the conviction.<\/p>\n The Justice Department brought the case against Bannon during Democrat Joe Biden\u2019s presidency, but it changed course after Trump took office again last year.<\/p>\n Bannon had initially argued that his testimony was protected by Trump\u2019s claim of executive privilege<\/a>. But the House panel and the Justice Department contended such a claim was dubious because Trump had fired Bannon from the White House<\/a> in 2017 and Bannon was thus a private citizen when he was consulting with the then-president in the run-up to the Capitol riot<\/a>.<\/p>\n