Oath Keepers Leader Stewart Rhodes Arrested in Jan. 6 Investigation

Stewart Rhodes, the person and laminitis of the far-right Oath Keepers militia, was arrested connected Thursday and charged with seditious conspiracy for organizing a wide-ranging crippled to tempest the Capitol past Jan. 6 and disrupt the certification of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s electoral victory, national instrumentality enforcement officials said.

The apprehension of Mr. Rhodes was a large measurement guardant successful the sprawling probe of the Capitol onslaught and the lawsuit marked the archetypal clip that prosecutors had filed charges of sedition. According to his lawyer, Jonathon Moseley, Mr. Rhodes was arrested astatine soon earlier 1 p.m.

Mr. Rhodes, a erstwhile Army paratrooper who went connected to gain a instrumentality grade astatine Yale, has been nether probe for his relation successful the riot since astatine slightest past outpouring when, against the proposal of his lawyer, helium sat down with F.B.I. agents for an interrogation successful Texas. He was astatine the Capitol connected Jan. 6, communicating by cellphone and a chat app with members of his team, galore of whom went into the building. But determination is nary grounds that helium entered the Capitol.

The Oath Keepers, on with the Proud Boys, person emerged arsenic the astir salient far-right extremists to person taken portion successful the battle connected the Capitol. Prosecutors person collected reams of grounds against them, including encrypted cellphone chats and recordings of online meetings. They person charged its members not lone with forcing their mode into the gathering successful a military-style “stack,” but besides with stationing an equipped “quick absorption force” astatine a edifice successful Virginia to beryllium acceptable to unreserved into Washington if needed.

Through their lawyers, members of the Oath Keepers who are already facing charges person said they converged connected Washington conscionable earlier Jan. 6 arsenic portion of a information item hired to support blimpish celebrities similar Roger J. Stone, Jr., the longtime state of erstwhile President Donald J. Trump.

In an interrogation with The New York Times this summer, Mr. Rhodes expressed vexation that respective members of his radical had “gone disconnected mission” by entering the Capitol connected Jan. 6, rapidly adding, “There were zero instructions from maine oregon enactment to bash so.”

But astatine slightest 4 Oath Keepers who were astatine the Capitol that time and are cooperating with the authorities person sworn successful tribunal papers that the radical intended to breach the gathering with the extremity of obstructing the last certification of the Electoral College vote.

Mr. Rhodes has besides attracted the attraction of the House prime committee investigating Jan. 6, which issued him a subpoena successful November. In a letter astatine the time, House investigators noted that Mr. Rhodes had taken portion successful respective events intended to question the integrity of the 2020 statesmanlike predetermination passim that autumn and winter.

On Election Day, according to the letter, Mr. Rhodes said that an “honest” number of the votes could lone effect successful a triumph for Mr. Trump and called connected members of his radical to “stock up connected ammo” and hole for a “full-on warfare successful the streets.”

Within a week of Election Day, Mr. Rhodes had told the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones that helium had men stationed extracurricular Washington prepared to enactment astatine Mr. Trump’s command.

Around the aforesaid time, national prosecutors say, helium urged his chap Oath Keepers astatine an online gathering to enactment Mr. Trump, calling him the “duly elected president” and adding: “You tin telephone it an insurrection oregon you tin telephone it a warfare oregon fight.”

The drumbeat continued done the winter, prosecutors say, arsenic Mr. Rhodes appeared astatine a pro-Trump rally successful Washington connected Dec. 12, 2020, and called connected Mr. Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act, suggesting that a nonaccomplishment to bash truthful would effect successful a “much much bloody war.” At the rally, Mr. Rhodes acknowledged successful a tv interrogation that helium and members of his radical were determination to supply information for personage speakers on with different shadowy paramilitary organization, the First Amendment Praetorian.

On Jan. 4, conscionable 2 days, earlier the storming of the Capitol, Mr. Rhodes posted an nonfiction connected the Oath Keepers website calling connected “all patriots” to “stand gangly successful enactment of President Trump’s combat to decision the enemies overseas and home who are attempting a coup.”

Key Figures successful the Jan. 6 Inquiry

With his distinctive achromatic oculus spot — the effect of a weapon mishap — Mr. Rhodes has been a fixture connected the acold close astir from the time successful 2009 that helium announced the instauration of the Oath Keepers astatine a rally successful Lexington, Mass., the tract of a celebrated Revolutionary War battle.

At the event, Mr. Rhodes laid retired an antigovernment level for the existent and erstwhile instrumentality enforcement and subject unit who joined his group, saying that his program was for members to disobey definite amerciable orders from officials and alternatively to uphold their oath to the Constitution.

During the years that President Barack Obama was successful office, the Oath Keepers repeatedly inserted themselves into salient nationalist conflicts, often playing the relation of heavy equipped vigilantes. In 2014, for instance, they turned up astatine a cattle ranch successful Nevada aft its owner, Cliven Bundy, engaged successful an equipped standoff with national onshore absorption officials. That aforesaid year, members of the radical went to Ferguson, Mo. on a self-appointed ngo to support section businesses from riots prompted by the decease of Michael Brown, a Black antheral who changeable by the police.

But aft Mr. Trump’s took office, Mr. Rhodes and the Oath Keepers pivoted distant from their antigovernment views and appeared to clasp the caller tone of nationalism and suspicions of a deep-state conspiracy that had taken basal successful Washington. Like different far-right groups specified arsenic the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers besides opposed — often physically — the Black Lives Matter protests that erupted successful the aftermath of the execution of George Floyd by the constabulary successful Minneapolis.

In precocious March, Mr. Rhodes himself publically acknowledged that the F.B.I. was aft him, declaring during a fiery code connected the Texas borderline that the Justice Department had undertaken a “persecution campaign” against his group.

“I whitethorn spell to jailhouse soon, not for thing I really did, but for made-up crimes,” helium said.