Stephen Bannon, who became Donald Trump’s campaign chief executive last week, was accused by his then-wife of physically attacking her while they were married.
The New York Post reported Thursday night that Bannon’s ex-wife Mary Louise Piccard filed a declaration in their mid-1990s divorce case which stated Bannon grabbed her “by the throat and arm.” According to the document, Bannon then threatened “to take the girls and leave.” The former Breitbart executive had twin girls with Piccard.
“I took the phone to call the police and he grabbed the phone away from me throwing it across the room, and breaking it as he [was] screaming that I was a ‘crazy fucking cunt!'” Piccard said in the divorce filing. The document went on to state that police responded to the 1996 incident and wrote up a report.
Following the incident Bannon told Piccard she had better leave town and that she didn’t have enough money to go to court against him. Piccard said in the document he told her “that if I wasn’t in town they couldn’t serve me and I wouldn’t have to go to court.”
“He also told me that if I went to court he and his attorney would make sure that I would be the one who was guilty. I was told that I could go anywhere in the world,” Piccard added. She headed his words and “because I was not present at the trial, the case was dismissed,” the document stated.
The incident happened on New Year’s Day 1996. The two got married on April 14, 1995 and later divorced. A spokesman for Bannon told the Post, “Steve has a great relationship with his ex-wife and his twins.”
Piccard said, “I have no comment and neither does my daughter.”
Piccard also mentioned in divorce filings that Bannon refused to marry her just because they were dating and she was pregnant. “Bannon made it clear that he would not marry me just because I was pregnant. I was scheduled for an amniocentesis and was told by the respondent that if the babies were normal we would get married,” Piccard claimed in the document.
She added, “After the test showed that the babies were normal the respondent sent over a prenuptial agreement for me to review.”
His ex-wife said in a filing that Bannon did not spend much time around the twins but when he did he was a proponent of corporal punishment.