The founder of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group has been arrested and charged with seditious conspiracy for allegedly organizing the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, during which he entered a restricted area and allegedly commanded those inside.
Stewart Rhodes, 56, the leader of the anti-government group, was taken into custody by federal officials in Little Elm, Texas, on Thursday, after a grand jury returned indictments against him and a core group of 10 Oath Keeper members.
They are accused of planning and carrying out the insurrection to stop the certification of President Joe Biden’s election victory.
The seditious conspiracy charge carries a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.
Rhodes, a former US Army paratrooper, is known for his eye patch – worn since he was 28.
A former firearms instructor, he dropped a loaded handgun and it shot him in the face, blinding him in his left eye.
Stewart Rhodes, the leader of the far-right Oath Keepers group, was arrested on Thursday on federal charges of seditious conspiracy related to the January 6 attack on the US Capitol
More than a dozen members and associates of the Oath Keepers have been indicted, making it the largest conspiracy case that has been brought so far over the riots
He is the highest-ranking member of an extremist group to be arrested in the deadly siege and it is the first time the Justice Department has brought a seditious conspiracy charge in connection with the Capitol riots.
The bar for proving sedition is not as high as it is for the related charge of treason. Still, sedition charges have been rare and are difficult to win.
In all, 19 members of associates of the Oath Keepers faces charges of corruptly obstructing an official proceeding by traveling to Washington intent on stopping lawmakers from declaring Biden the election winner.
Rhodes and Edward Vallejo, 63, of Phoenix, Arizona, were arrested on Thursday.
The others who were charged were already facing criminal charges related to the attack.
Those include Thomas Caldwell, 67, of Berryville, Virginia; Joseph Hackett, 51, of Sarasota, Florida; Kenneth Harrelson, 41, of Titusville, Florida; Joshua James, 34, of Arab, Alabama; Kelly Meggs, 52, of Dunnellon, Florida; Roberto Minuta, 37, of Prosper, Texas; David Moerschel, 44, of Punta Gorda, Florida; Brian Ulrich, 44, of Guyton, Georgia and Jessica Watkins, 39, of Woodstock, Ohio.
Jonathan Moseley, an attorney representing Rhodes, described his client’s indictment and arrest as ‘an unusual situation.’
Moseley said Rhodes was supposed to testify before the House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection in a deposition but it got called off. He was talking to Rhodes on the phone about the committee when Rhodes was contacted by the FBI.
Rhodes did not enter the Capitol building on January 6 but is accused of helping put into motion the violence that disrupted the certification of the vote.
The Oath Keepers case is the largest conspiracy case federal authorities have brought so far over January 6, when thousands of pro-Trump rioters stormed past police barriers and smashed windows, injuring dozens of officers and sending lawmakers running.
The indictment alleges that, after the election, Rhodes conspired with his co-defendants and others ‘to oppose by force the execution of the laws governing the transfer of presidential power by Jan. 20, 2021.’
Authorities say Rhodes held a GoToMeeting call days after the election, telling his followers to go to Washington and let Trump know ‘that the people are behind him.’
Rhodes told members they should be prepared to fight Antifa and that some Oath Keepers should ‘stay on the outside’ and be ‘prepared to go in armed’ if necessary.
‘We’re going to defend the president, the duly elected president, and we call on him to do what needs to be done to save our country. Because if you don’t, guys, you’re going to be in a bloody, bloody civil war, and a bloody – you can call it an insurrection or you can call it a war or fight,’ Rhodes said, according to court documents.
Authorities have said Rhodes was part of an encrypted Signal chat with Oath Keepers from multiple states leading up to January 6 called ‘DC OP: Jan 6 21’ and it showed the group was ‘activating a plan to use force’ that day.
Beginning in December 2020, Rhodes and his fellow militiamen allegedly used encrypted and private communications apps to coordinate and plan to travel to Washington DC on January 6, the date of the certification of the electoral college vote.
Federal authorities claimed that Rhodes and several others planned to bring weapons and ammunition with them.
According to the indictment, the defendants carried out the conspiracy by organizing into teams, recruiting additional members, hosting training sessions to teach paramilitary combat tactics, bringing tactical gear and weapons, including knives and batons, to the Capitol grounds.
Days before the attack, one defendant suggested in a text message getting a boat to ferry weapons across the Potomac River to their ‘waiting arms,’ prosecutors say.
The suspects’ efforts culminated with them ‘breaching and attempting to take control of the Capitol grounds and building on Jan. 6, 2021, in an effort to prevent, hinder and delay the certification of the electoral college vote,’ according to the US Department of Justice.
The indictment alleges that after the failed insurrection, the Oath Keepers and their affiliates continued the thwarted plot by using social media, text messaging and encrypted apps to communicate with co-conspirators.
Rhodes has said in interviews with right-wing hosts that there was no plan to storm the Capitol and that the members who did so went rogue. But he has continued to push the lie that the 2020 election was stolen, while posts on the Oath Keepers website have depicted the group as a victim of political persecution.
On January 6, a large crowd began to gather outside the Capitol perimeter as the Joint Session of Congress got under way at 1pm following a fiery speech by then-President Donald Trump.
That afternoon, authorities say Rhodes told the group over Signal: ‘All I see Trump doing is complaining. I see no intent by him to do anything. So the patriots are taking it into their own hands. They´ve had enough.’
A federal indictment that was unsealed on Thursday alleges that Oath Keepers and their affiliates breached the US Capitol after planning to travel to Washington DC with weapons and tactical gear to ‘delay the certification of the electoral college vote’
Donovan Ray Crowl, who has since been indicted by federal authorities for his role in the siege on the US Capitol, marches down the east front steps of the Capitol with members of the Oath Keepers militia
OATH KEEPERS: THE FAR-RIGHT MILITIA GROUP THAT BELIEVES FED GOVERNMENT PLANS TO IMPOSE MARTIAL LAW
Rhodes, a Yale Law graduate and Army paratrooper, founded the Oath Keepers in 2009
Elmer Stewart Rhodes, a former US Army paratrooper and Yale Law School graduate from Texas, started the Oath Keepers in 2009, and the group has grown into one of the nation’s largest anti-government militias, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The core idea of Rhodes’ group, the Oath Keepers, is that its members vow to support the oaths they took on joining law enforcement or the military to defend the Constitution forever and the group’s own list of 10 “Orders We Will Not Obey.” The list is a compendium of perceived, unrealized threats from the government – orders, for instance, to force Americans into concentration camps, confiscate their guns or cooperate with foreign troops in the United States. These supposed threats are, in fact, part of the central conspiracy theory advocated by the antigovernment movement of which the Oath Keepers is a part – the baseless claim that the federal government plans to impose martial law, seize Americans’ weapons, force those who resist into concentration camps and, ultimately, push the country into a one-world socialistic government known as the “New World Order.”
In 2013, the group announced the planned formation of “Citizen Preservation” militias meant to defend Americans against the New World Order. With Rhodes at the helm, the group continued to promote their own version of vigilante justice by providing voluntary and sometimes illegal security during tense situations in America, after a terrorist attack and during the protests in Ferguson, Missouri, and by taking part in multiple standoffs against the government.
In 2014, Oath Keeper members joined an armed standoff between federal officials and Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy over grazing rights on government land.
Later that year and in 2015, members patrolled the streets of Ferguson, Missouri, amid protests over the police killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown. They wore camouflage body armor and openly carried rifles.
Rhodes had his group patrol the polls in an activity they called Operation Sabot during the 2016 Presidential election.
Rhodes and Oath Keepers supported Trump during his presidency. During this time, Rhodes became increasingly conspiratorial, adopting and peddling a number of fringe right-wing conspiracy theories with the assistance of his friend Alex Jones. These ideas included false claims that a large illegal voting operation was coordinated ahead of the 2016 general election, the portrayal of immigrants from Central and South America as waging a war on the “the West to flood us with Third World people,” and mobilizing his followers to take part in the January 2021 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol Building in an effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
According to newly unsealed indictments, Rhodes and members of his group played a major role in the January 6 riots at the US Capitol after arriving in Washington DC to hinder the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.
Stewart Rhodes grew up in the Southwest and joined the Army after finishing high school. He became a paratrooper, receiving an honorable discharge due to an injury in a night parachuting accident. He attended college at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, graduating in 1998. During his time there, Rhodes claims he taught rape prevention at the college women’s center, and it was also during that period that he bounced around a number of other jobs including working as a certified concealed-carry firearms instructor and a valet driver.
After college, his first politically oriented job was supervising interns in Washington, D.C., for Libertarian Ron Paul, then a Republican congressman from Texas. Rhodes subsequently attended Yale Law School, graduating in 2004, and clerked for Arizona Supreme Court Justice Michael D. Ryan. He later volunteered on Paul’s failed 2008 presidential campaign.
Following his experience with the Paul campaign, Rhodes published one of his first political diatribes. Appearing on his blog in January 2008, the post blasted political opponents’ charges that Paul was linked to hate groups and racists. (The congressman’s Ron Paul Report, in fact, did contain many racist statements over the years, but Paul has claimed that he did not write or read them). Using the fevered language that would become his trademark, Rhodes railed against the “full-blown smear campaign.” Calling it a “lame attempt at guilt by association” and “stupid,” he added, “This only tells me that Ron Paul is a real threat to the political establishment, and they are pulling out all the stops in an attempt to stop the Ron Paul Revolution.” Rhodes went on to disclose that his maternal ancestors were Hispanic and “American-Indian,” and made the argument that because he was “mixed-race” and saw no indication of racism, the claims against Paul had no merit.
Rhodes then took a hard-right turn away from electoral politics in 2009, forming the Oath Keepers, a Nevada nonprofit organization. He began recruiting current and former military officers, veterans and police officers, and started the Oath Keepers blog. At a rally in Lexington, Massachusetts. On April 19, 2009, Rhodes officially launched the Oath Keepers before a large crowd of first responders.
Rhodes moved from Nevada to Montana, relocating his law practice and joining a growing movement presence in the Big Sky state.
By 2011, the Oath Keepers had members in every state, Rhodes said, the group was claiming to have more than 30,000 people on its membership rolls, although that is an unverifiable and highly unlikely number.
Rhodes’ fervent call to resist perceived government overreach has been amplified with frequent media appearances on platforms offered by megaphone-wielding demagogues such as radio conspiracy-monger Alex Jones, and through alliances with right-wing groups, including extreme Tea Party factions.
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center
Crowd members eventually forced their way through, up and over US Capitol Police barricades and advanced to the building’s exterior façade, according to the Justice Department.
Shortly after 2pm, rioters forced their way inside the Capitol by breaking windows, ramming open doors, and assaulting Capitol police and other law enforcement officers.
Around 2.30pm, Rhodes had a 97-second phone call with Kelly Meggs, the reputed leader of the group’s Florida chapter, who was part of the military-style stack, authorities say.
About 10 minutes later, Rhodes sent a photo to the group showing the southeast side of the Capitol with the caption, ‘South side of US Capitol. Patriots pounding on doors.’ Around that same time, those in the stack formation forcibly entered the Capitol, prosecutors say.
Federal officials argue that Rhodes and his cohorts came to Washington DC intent on stopping lawmakers from certifying President Joe Biden’s election victory
At about this time, according to the indictment, Rhodes entered the restricted area of the Capitol grounds and directed his followers to meet him at the Capitol.
Some 30 minutes later, as detailed in the indictment, a group of Oath Keepers – many wearing paramilitary clothing and patches with the militia’s name, logo, and insignia – were photographed marching in a ‘stack’ formation up the east steps of the Capitol, joining a mob, and making their way inside.
Later, another detachment of Oath Keepers formed a second ‘stack’ and breached the Capitol grounds, marching from the west side to the east side of the Capitol building and up the east stairs and into the building, documents alleged.
While some Oath Keepers stormed the building, others remained stationed just outside of the city in quick reaction force, which, according to the indictment, ‘were prepared to rapidly transport firearms and other weapons into Washington, D.C., in support of operations aimed at using force to stop the lawful transfer of presidential power.’
Oath Keeper defendants have argued in court that the only plan was to provide security at the rally before the riot or protect themselves against possible attacks from far-left antifa activists.
Rhodes, a Yale Law School graduate, started the Oath Keepers in 2009, and the group has grown into one of the nation’s largest anti-government militias, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
In 2014, Oath Keeper members joined an armed standoff between federal officials and Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy over grazing rights on government land.
Later that year and in 2015, members patrolled the streets of Ferguson, Missouri, amid protests over the police killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown. They wore camouflage body armor and openly carried rifles.
The Oath Keepers and members of other extremist groups, such as the Proud Boys, make up just part of the more than 580 people who have been charged in the January 6 riot. But several of their leaders, members and associates have become the central targets of the Justice Department’s sprawling investigation as authorities work to determine to what extent the attack was plotted in advance.
The last time US prosecutors brought a seditious conspiracy case was in 2010 in an alleged Michigan plot by members of the Hutaree militia to incite an uprising against the government.
But a judge ordered acquittals on the sedition conspiracy charges at a 2012 trial, saying prosecutors relied too much on hateful diatribes protected by the First Amendment and didn’t, as required, prove the accused ever had detailed plans for a rebellion.
Among the last successful convictions for seditious conspiracy stemmed from another, now largely forgotten storming of the Capitol in 1954, when four Puerto Rican nationalists opened fire on the House floor, wounding five representatives.