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WASHINGTON (AP) — The founder of the Oath Keepers extremist group and four associates planned an “armed rebellion” to keep President Donald Trump in power, a federal prosecutor contended Monday as the most serious case yet went to trial in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Stewart
Rhodes and his band of extremists were prepared to go to war to stop Joe Biden
from becoming president, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Nestler told jurors.
The group celebrated the Capitol attack as a victory in that fight and
continued their plot even after Biden’s electoral victory was certified,
Nestler alleged.
“Their goal
was to stop, by whatever means necessary, the lawful transfer of presidential
power, including by taking up arms against the United States government,” the
prosecutor said during his opening statement. “They concocted a plan for armed
rebellion to shatter a bedrock of American democracy.”
The
defendants are the first among hundreds of people arrested in the Capitol riot
to stand trial on seditious conspiracy, a rare Civil War-era charge that calls
for up to 20 years behind bars. The stakes are high for the Justice Department,
which last secured such a conviction at trial nearly 30 years ago, and intends
to try two more groups on the charge later this year.
The trial
comes as Trump continues to insist, against much evidence, that the 2020
election was stolen from him, and as vocal pushback against the charges filed
against those who entered the Capitol continues in some quarters. The broader
reaction could show how the American public, as well as the jury, sees the attack,
nearly two years later.
Defense
attorneys accused prosecutors of cherry-picking comments from messages and
videos and said the government has no evidence there ever was any plan to
attack the Capitol. Rhodes’ attorney said his client will take the stand and
show that the Oath Keepers had merely been preparing for orders they expected
from Trump but never came.
“Stewart
Rhodes meant no harm to the Capitol that day. Stewart Rhodes did not have any
violent intent that day,” Rhodes’ attorney, Phillip Linder, said. “The story
the government is trying to tell you today is completely wrong.”
On trial
with Rhodes, of Granbury, Texas, are Kelly Meggs, leader of the Florida chapter
of the Oath Keepers; Kenneth Harrelson, another Florida Oath Keeper; Thomas
Caldwell, a retired U.S. Navy intelligence officer from Virginia, and Jessica
Watkins, who led an Ohio militia group. They face several other charges as
well.
They are
among roughly 900 people who have been charged in the attack, which temporarily
halted the certification of Biden’s victory, sent lawmakers running for cover
and left dozens of police officers injured.
In the Oath
Keepers case, prosecutors will try to prove that their actions were not a
spontaneous outpouring of election-fueled rage but part of a detailed, drawn-out
plot to stop Biden from entering the White House.
The Oath
Keepers “were prepared in November, they were prepared in December and when the
opportunity finally presented itself on Jan 6, 2021, they sprang into action,”
Nestler said.
Rhodes began
plotting to overturn Biden’s victory right after the election, Nestler said. In
November 2020, Rhodes sent his followers a step-by-step plan for stopping the
transfer of power based on a popular uprising that brought down Yugoslavia’s
president two decades earlier.
Around the
same time, Rhodes was also communicating in another internet group — which
included Trump ally Roger Stone — that was called “FOS,” or “Friends of Stone,”
according to testimony. On Nov. 7, 2020, Rhodes said in a message to that group
that he was on his way to D.C. for a possible “op” and was available to meet
“face-to-face.”
As December
approached, Rhodes’ rhetoric became increasingly violent and desperate, Nestler
said.
In messages
and comments read to the jury, the Oath Keepers repeatedly warned of violence
if Biden were to become president. During a December interview, Rhodes called
senators “traitors” and warned that the Oath Keepers would have to “overthrow,
abort or abolish Congress.” He described Jan. 6 as a “hard constitutional
deadline” for stopping the transfer of power.
The Oath
Keepers organized training, including one session on “unconventional warfare.”
Before coming to Washington, they stashed “weapons of war” at a Virginia hotel
to serve as “quick reaction force” that could get guns into the capital quickly
if necessary, the prosecutor said.
As Oath
Keepers stormed the Capitol in helmets and other battle gear, Rhodes remained
on the outside, like “a general surveying his troops on a battlefield,” Nestler
said. After the attack, the elated Oath Keepers went to a Virginia restaurant
to celebrate their victory, the prosecutor said.
In the days
between the riot and Biden’s inauguration, Rhodes spent more than $17,000 on
firearm parts, ammunition and other items, prosecutors say. Shortly after the
insurrection, Rhodes was secretly recorded saying that his “only regret is that
they should have brought rifles,” Nestler said.
Among those
who may testify during the trial, which will last several weeks, are three Oath
Keepers who’ve pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy and are cooperating with
prosecutors in hopes of getting lighter sentences. They include a man who says
that after arriving in Washington, Meggs told him that another Florida Oath
Keeper had brought explosives in his RV.
The
government’s first witness was a FBI agent, who responded on Jan. 6 to help
rescue senators. He described lawmakers crying, broken doors and windows and a
scene that “looked like a bomb had gone off.”
Defense
lawyers say prosecutors have ripped the Oath Keepers’ messages out of context
to paint them unfairly. The Oath Keepers came to Washington to provide security
at events for figures such as Stone before the president’s big outdoor rally
behind the White House, defense lawyers said. Rhodes’ attorney described the
group as a “peacekeeping” force and called his client an “extremely patriotic”
man who “loves this country.”
Rhodes’
attorneys plan to argue that Rhodes believed Trump was going to going to invoke
the Insurrection Act and call up a militia, which Rhodes had been calling on
him to do to stop Biden from becoming president. Rhodes’ lawyers have said he
was merely lobbying the president to invoke a U.S. law.
Prosecutors
say it’s clear the Oath Keepers were going to act regardless of what Trump did.
Nestler told jurors that Rhodes, a Yale Law School graduate, was only using the
Insurrection Act as “legal cover.” In one message, Rhodes wrote in December
2020 that Trump “needs to know that if he fails to act, then we will.”
An attorney
for Caldwell said his client is a disabled veteran who didn’t even know of the
Oath Keepers until November 2020. The defense lawyer, David Fischer, called
Jan. 6 a “black eye” for the country, but said Caldwell merely came to
Washington “on a date with his wife” and wasn’t een planning to go to the
Capitol until Trump’s speech on the Ellipse before the riot.
“Mr.
Caldwell couldn’t storm his way out of a paper bag,” Fischer said. “I came here
to clear his name.”
This story
has been corrected to reflect that there are five defendants, not five men, on
trial.
For full
coverage of the Capitol riot, go to https://www.apnews.com/capitol-siege
More on
Donald Trump-related investigations: https://apnews.com/hub/donald-trump