Peter Navarro: Senior Counselor to the President

Peter Navarro was one of the most active White House figures in the effort to overturn the 2020 election result, and was imprisoned for contempt of Congress over the January 6 investigation before returning to the White House as a high-ranking Trump advisor.

Worst moments:

• Self-published a lengthy report in late 2020 claiming that “President Trump won.”
• Participated in a phone call with Trump and Rudy Giuliani in which they tried to pressure state legislators to change their states’ election results.
• Worked with Steve Bannon to devise the plan to overturn the 2020 election results by convincing Mike Pence to deny certification of electoral votes on January 6th.
• Refused to comply with Congress’ January 6th investigation, leading to a prison sentence for contempt.

History of election denial

Between December 2020 and January 2021, Navarro made a major contribution to the “stolen election” narrative through a self-published three-volume dossier. Navarro claimed to document dozens of “irregularities” across six battleground states, citing sources including Steve Bannon to claim that “President Trump won.”

In substance, the reports recycled allegations that had already been rejected. They contained debunked allegations of voter fraud including “the large-scale manufacturing of fake ballots, bribery, and dead voters,” as well as discredited conspiracy theories tying voting-machine companies to a former Venezuelan dictator, the Clinton Foundation, and George Soros. The January 6 committee later characterized the volumes bluntly, noting they discuss disproven claims of alleged voter fraud and cite unsupported allegations from cases that courts dismissed.

Navarro’s most consequential actions went beyond writing, as he worked directly to pressure state legislators to overturn the election results. On January 2, 2021, he joined a call with Rudy Giuliani, then-President Trump, and hundreds of state legislators aimed at getting certain states to overturn their results. While Navarro told the legislators that “Your job, I believe, is to take action, action, action,” Trump explicitly asked the legislators to change the certified elections’ results, saying “You are the real power … You're more important than the courts.”

He and Steve Bannon devised the plan Navarro dubbed the “Green Bay Sweep,” a coordinated scheme to “keep President Trump in the White House for a second term” by encouraging Vice President Pence to delay certification of the electoral college results on January 6th. Pence declined to go along, citing his lack of authority to reject electoral votes. Navarro's refusal to cooperate with the investigation into that plan eventually landed him in prison. The House January 6 committee subpoenaed him on February 9, 2022; he refused to produce documents or testify, was indicted in June 2022 on two counts, and was found guilty by a jury on one count for refusing to appear and one for refusing to produce documents. In January 2024, Judge Amit Mehta sentenced him to four months in jail, telling Navarro at sentencing that the punishment was of his “own making” as he rejected the claim of political prosecution. Navarro reported to a federal prison in Miami in March 2024, becoming the first former White House official imprisoned for a contempt-of-Congress conviction.

Influence in the current administration

Navarro returned to the White House in 2025 as Senior Counselor to the President for Trade and Manufacturing, an appointment which Trump framed as a reward for loyalty. Navarro has since been a highly influential member of the Trump administration as one of the chief architects of its aggressive tariff policies. The most visible measure of his standing was his very public 2025 feud with Elon Musk over tariffs. In the end, Navarro's tariff approach prevailed while Musk exited the administration's orbit, demonstrating the depth of Navarro’s personal influence with Trump.