Stewart Rhodes, previously sentenced to 18 years for seditious conspiracy, was at the Capitol Wednesday chatting up lawmakers and reporters.
The Justice Department is asking a federal judge to drop his recent order barring Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes — who was freed from prison by President Donald Trump earlier this week — and several top allies from entering Washington D.C. or the Capitol without permission.
Acting U.S. attorney for D.C. Ed Martin, a longtime advocate for Jan. 6 defendants, signed the motion asking U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta to reverse his position, issued just hours earlier on Friday. The defendants “are no longer subject to terms of supervised release and probation,” he wrote.
Martin followed up his motion with a press statement.
“If a judge decided that Jim Biden, General Mark Milley, or another individual were forbidden to visit America’s capital — even after receiving a last-minute, preemptive pardon from the former President — I believe most Americans would object,” Martin said in a statement. “The individuals referenced in our motion have had their sentences commuted — period, end of sentence.”
Mehta’s order appeared to be a response to Rhodes’ decision to hold court in the Capitol Wednesday, just days after Trump commuted his 18-year prison sentence for seditious conspiracy, related to his role in the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol. It also applied to several of Rhodes’ co-defendants in the case.
“You must not knowingly enter the United States Capitol Building or onto surrounding grounds known as Capitol Square … without first obtaining the permission from the court,” Mehta wrote in his order, which he also said applied to the other Oath Keepers whose sentences were commuted by Trump.
Mehta said last month that the thought of Rhodes being “absolved” by the incoming Trump administration was “frightening” and “ought to be frightening to anyone who cares about democracy in this country.”
Rhodes responded to Mehta’s order, in a video posted Friday by ally Ivan Raiklin, urging Trump to grant him and other Oath Keepers full pardons so they could be free of all their obligations to the court. He said Mehta’s order appeared to be “retaliation” for his decision to go to the Capitol Wednesday to meet with lawmakers and reporters.
For several hours at the Capitol, Rhodes interviewed with numerous reporters, met with allies in a Dunkin’ Donuts and visited Republican lawmakers. A jury in 2022 convicted Rhodes of seditious conspiracy, finding that he orchestrated an attempt to violently prevent the transfer of presidential power from Trump to Joe Biden. Witnesses testified that Rhodes and other Oath Keepers leaders assembled a massive arsenal of firearms at a hotel in Arlington, Virginia, that they were prepared to shuttle into Washington if the fighting at the Capitol escalated further.
During the trial, prosecutors revealed a Jan. 10, 2021, recording of Rhodes in which he said “My only regret is they should have brought rifles” to the Capitol.
“We could have fixed it right then and there,” Rhodes said. “I’d hang fucking Pelosi from the lamppost.”
Although Trump pardoned most Jan. 6 rioters, he opted to commute the sentences of most of the defendants who faced charges of seditious conspiracy.
