Stewart Rhodes, the founder and leader of far-right extremist group the Oath Keepers, has been arrested in connection with his role in the fatal Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot.
As the New York Times reports, Rhodes was arrested by the FBI on Thursday on a seditious conspiracy charge. The 56-year-old previously said he didn’t enter the Capitol building, but communications with his team on that day show he was speaking with people who did trespass. Rhodes, a former paratrooper and graduate of Yale Law, is one of the most high-profile arrests in connection with the Capitol riot so far.
Rhodes’ lawyer Jonathon Moseley confirmed his client was taken in by the FBI around 1 p.m. on Thursday. His arrest comes after a federal grand jury said members of the Oath Keepers planned to obstruct the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 election win, per the Washington Post. 10 other Oath Keepers members and associates have also been arrested, according to those close to the investigation.
Rhodes has been under investigation since at least last spring after he spoke with FBI agents in Texas. In an interview with the Washington Post last year, Rhodes said he spoke with associates on Jan. 6 to “keep them out of trouble,” and claimed any individuals who were inside the Capitol “went totally off mission.”
Following the 2020 election results, Rhodes told far-right conspiracy theorist and supplements salesman Alex Jones that he had men stationed outside of Washington prepared to fight for Trump. Around that time, he told Oath Keepers members that Trump is the “duly elected president.” He also made direct reference to an “insurrection or you can call it a war or fight.”
Just two days before Jan. 6, Stewart Rhodes posted an article to the Oath Keepers website urging “all patriots” to “stand tall in support of President Trump’s fight to defeat the enemies foreign and domestic who are attempting a coup.” He founded the group as an antigovernment militia in 2009, but that stance changed to a more ultranationalist approach when Trump took office in 2016.
Before this week, a total of 19 alleged Oath Keepers members had been charged for their involvement, and two have since pleaded guilty. Four have said they intended to breach the building in hopes of halting Biden’s victory from being certified.
