The US Supreme Court cleared the way for the Trump administration to wipe out conservative activist Stephen Bannon’s criminal conviction for defying a congressional subpoena.

Acting on a joint request by Bannon and the Justice Department, the justices set aside a federal appeals court decision that upheld his conviction, which led to a four-month prison term. The move sends the case back to a trial judge in Washington to consider US Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s request to dismiss the indictment.

Pirro wrote in her Feb. 9 motion that “the government has determined in its prosecutorial discretion that dismissal of this criminal case is in the interests of justice.” Federal judges generally have little authority to overrule the Justice Department’s decision to withdraw charges while a case is active.