Peter Navarro, the former top economic aide in former President Donald Trump’s White House, who is currently languishing in federal prison serving a multi-month sentence for having stood up against subpoenas from the January 6 committee last Congress, is speaking out now from behind bars in an exclusive interview with Breitbart News.
Navarro, who was the director of Trump’s White House’s National Trade Council, is 74 years old and is currently incarcerated in a federal prison in Miami. He is on track to be released in mid-July, around the time of his 75th birthday.
Peter Navarro speaks to reporters as he arrives at the E. Barrett Prettyman Courthouse on September 7, 2023, in Washington, DC. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Navarro is also publishing a book this summer, called the The New MAGA Deal, aimed at exploring and explaining populist nationalist philosophy on things like trade and economic policy—the core of his portfolio when he served Trump in the White House. Navarro is a true populist’s populist, too, and went from being a Democrat decades ago to a top Trump adviser and Republican in recent years. This interview with Navarro focuses on his views on the weaponization of government by Democrats against Republicans like himself and Trump as well as on his views on Biden’s approach versus Trump’s approach to consequential American adversaries like China. Navarro also puts the stakes of the 2024 presidential election in the clearest possible terms, saying quite clearly that if Biden wins things will get worse for every American but if Trump wins the inverse is true.
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The interview obviously comes after Trump himself was convicted in New York last week in his business records trial, and awaits sentencing the week before the Republican National Convention in July.
Navarro conducted this interview in writing from prison. Breitbart News sent him several questions, and he replied to them a few days later. What follows is a complete transcript of the written interview, with the full questions from Breitbart News and Navarro’s full answers from behind bars.
BREITBART NEWS: What’s your reaction to the Trump verdict?
PETER NAVARRO: For me, it was deja vu all over again, and there is much for Americans — and journalists — to learn by studying the parallels between my case and President Trump’s.
I’m the first senior White House official ever to be convicted of contempt of Congress. My old boss is the first president ever to be convicted of a felony.
I’m guilty of nothing more than defending the Constitutional separation of powers and George Washington’s doctrine of executive privilege against a Democrat lawfare attack. President Trump isn’t even guilty of the misdemeanors he was charged with while these misdemeanors were “belt and suspendered” into felonies with prison time only through prosecutorial misconduct and judicial chicanery.
WATCH — Biden Flashes Big Grin When Asked About Trump Being a “Political Prisoner”:
C-SPANIn both my case and President Trump’s, Democrats were involved at every step of the inquisition. A Democrat majority in Congress held me in contempt on a strict party line vote, a Democrat Attorney General prosecuted me despite a more than 50-year policy of absolute testimonial immunity for senior White House advisors, a Democrat judge stripped me of every possible defense before a jury of 12 never-Trump jurors drawn from a pool that voted over 90% for Biden found me guilty.
With President Trump, a George Soros-backed Marxist DA ran on a platform of putting Trump in prison, a radical Democrat judge in Juan Merchan stripped Trump of both witnesses and defenses, and a Manhattan jury drawn from a pool of voters who went 95% for Biden found him guilty.
In both my case and Donald Trump, this was not equal justice under law but unrestrained lawfare designed to interfere with the 2024 election. It is the likes of Merchan and Bragg and Fani Willis, and Merrick Garland and Jack Smith who belong in prison, not me or the greatest president in modern history.
BREITBART NEWS: Do you think President Trump will be sentenced to prison?
PETER NAVARRO: Again my case is instructive. Just look at where I am writing this from — a prison in Miami.
In my case, Democrat Judge Amit Mehta freely admitted that I had refused to testify before Congress because I firmly believed that once Donald Trump invoked executive privilege, it was not my privilege to waive and I had a duty to the Constitution and my oath of office to do what I did.
Under those circumstances, Mehta should have given me no more than a 30-day suspended sentence and sent me on my way. Instead, and ironically, he gave me the maximum possible time under the guidelines and even cleverly structured the sentence in a way to deny me any sentence reduction under the First Step Act that Donald Trump signed and I had lobbied for. It was cruel and unusual punishment right out of the Democrat lawfare game plan.
Judge Juan Merchan is likely to do exactly the same thing. I look for a prison sentence for Donald Trump. Most importantly, I also believe that Merchan will refuse to release President Trump pending an almost certain victory on appeal.
This is exactly what happened to me. Judge Amit Mehta knew damn well my case will be overturned on appeal — otherwise, the Constitutional separation of powers will be irrevocably damaged. Yet, unlike in a similar case with Steve Bannon with a different judge, Mehta refused to release me on appeal and now here I am in a Joe Biden prison. When I win my appeal, I will have already served my sentence and have been irreparably harmed.
Merchan’s gambit will be even more nefarious. He will sentence Trump on the eve of the Republican National Convention in July and may even try to block Trump from traveling to Milwaukee to accept his party’s nomination for president by refusing to release him pending appeal.
Wake up America. This is happening in our country and there’s not a dime’s worth of difference now between the courts in Communist China and Russia and the good ole U.S. of A.
BREITBART NEWS: What’s it like in prison? Are people familiar with who you are? What’s the reaction?
PETER NAVARRO: Miami is a particularly tough prison. It’s not really “minimum security” but surrounded by razor wire with tight protocols to monitor inmates. Prescription drugs are hard to come by, the food is low in protein and calories, high in sugar and carbohydrates, and certain to worsen any conditions ranging from diabetes and hypertension to heart conditions and kidney issues. A new strain of COVID hit the facility a month ago and spread like wildfire in the cramped dorm conditions. The rec yard is littered with 30-year-old exercise bikes and other equipment that don’t work while an ornery facility administrator before my time lugged off all of the strength training equipment. There’s few inmate training or certification programs and little but time on most inmates’ hands. It’s no country for old men.
The good news is that the vast majority of inmates love Donald Trump for passing the 2018 First Step Act and hate Joe Biden for not implementing it. Same with the corrections officers — Trump and I respect the uniform and they know that while they also know Biden has been a disaster.
If I were a Bidenite, things would be a lot tougher here — and yes, they know exactly who I am and respect the fact that I stood up for a principle and didn’t bow to the government.
BREITBART NEWS: Do you think if you were a Democrat or Biden supporter you would be where you are today?
PETER NAVARRO: Of course not. This is lawfare unchained, and the Democrats play it for keeps while, at least up to this point, Republicans haven’t had either the balls or brains to fight back Old Testament style. Until the Democrats fear they could wind up in the same prisons they put me and are trying to put Donald Trump, Jeff Clark, Mark Meadows, John Eastman, Rudy Giuliani et al in, they will keep doing what they are doing.
If Trump wins and asks if I want to serve again, I may ask for Special Prosecutor. These lawfare bandits must be held accountable for their flagrant election interference.
WATCH — Trump Lawyer Scharf: If Necessary, We Will Take Conviction Appeal to Supreme Court:
BREITBART NEWS: What is your message to the broader America First conservative movement? What should they take away from your incarceration?
PETER NAVARRO: Simply, if they can come for me — and they put me first in leg irons and then in prison — they can come for you. And the only thing now standing in their way is Donald Trump.
It is paramount we win the 2024 election for many reasons — Donald Trump will crush inflation, seal our border, keep the dogs of war with Communist China, Iran, Russia and North Korea at bay, stop the Democrats from mutilating the genitals of our young boys and destroying girls’ sports and dreams with a transgender nightmare, and make college graduations safe again from radicals.
But we also must put Donald Trump back behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office to put an end to Joe Biden’s and Merrick Garland’s dual system of injustice that now threatens us all — from soccer moms at school board meetings protesting the grooming and indoctrination of our children to patriots who stand at the ramparts to protect the sanctity of the ballot box.
The Biden Crime Family — Hunter, James, and Joe; The Soros-backed Inquisitors — Bragg, Willis, and Marchan; The Orwellian Demons — Garland and Smith; The America Haters — Omar, Talaib, and AOC. Guantanamo is too good for them. Accountability now for their lies and election interference!
BREITBART NEWS: How will you carry your message to the American people? What role will you play in the Trump 2024 campaign?
PETER NAVARRO: As I have been in prison these last months, my new book, The New MAGA Deal (www.newmagadeal.com) has been in the printing process and is now on its way to bookstores and Amazon warehouses everyone. The New MAGA Deal is published by Don Jr.’s publishing house, it’s the unofficial guide to the Trump 2024 campaign platform, and my mission is to put this blueprint and battle cry for the modern MAGA movement into as many hands as possible.
In the spirit of the canon of Steve Bannon — Action! Action! Action! — The New MAGA Deal lays out 100 actions in the first 100 days of the Trump administration on everything from crushing inflation, securing our border and putting an end to America’s endless wars to restoring equal justice under law, defending women’s sports, and restoring sanity and ending wokeness in our K-12 curricula.
Importantly, The New MAGA Deal will help Trump supporters explain in the plainest of terms what the Trump and MAGA agenda is — simply plain, God, Family, and Country common sense. We must not let the radical Democrats portray us as extremists. We must force them to look in their own mirror at the ugliness of their ideology. That’s what The New MAGA Deal will help do.
BREITBART NEWS: What do you make of Joe Biden putting tariffs on Communist China even as we learn more about Hunter and how he leveraged his father’s close relationship with China’s dictator Xi Jinping?
PETER NAVARRO: A lot of the salacious coverage of Hunter focuses on the porn and the crack and the sex trafficking. But Hunter’s worst crime was to sell this country out for a few pieces of silver, and with each new revelation, it’s pretty damn clear the “Big Guy” Joey was in on the action. That’s unregistered foreign lobbying at best and treason at worst.
Against that backdrop, it makes it all the more disingenuous that Joe is trying to out-tariff the King of China Tariffs, Donald Trump, in the run up to the 2024 election. The irony is that Joe Biden create:d the need for tariffs on Made in China electric vehicles through a Green Bad Deal that effectively exports our auto industry to Shanghai.
If more of the mainstream media did their jobs — thank God for the likes of Breitbart and Bannon’s War Room — Bidenomics would be exposed for the Chinese shell game it is.
WATCH — AWR Hawkins: Average Joe Would Pay “Steep Price for Doing a Fraction” of What Hunter Biden Has Done:
BREITBART NEWS: If Trump doesn’t win the election, what happens to this country?
PETER NAVARRO: Double digit inflation, stagnant wages, dog food for pensioners; a hot or cyber war with Iran, Communist China and/or Russia; more rape, murder by fentanyl, terrorism, downward wage pressures, and rising welfare costs from a flood of illegal aliens; unrestrained Democrat lawfare; the end of free speech and assembly; more conservatives and Republicans behind bars for their patriotism; the destruction of women’s sports and more mutilation of young boys’ genitals; a corporate media and social media that will continually revise our history to match the woke ideology. Did I mention no home or car ownership or marriage and babies for much of our younger generations?
Look at what has happened to me, prosecuted and imprisoned for honoring my oath of office and defending the Constitution. It’s your choice: poverty and prison or prosperity and peace. Biden or Trump.
You will decide! Please get involved in this election. Send the Trump campaign a check. Volunteer at your local Republican Party. Spread the gospel of Trump and MAGA. You are the vessel of change. Failure is not an option.
