A few weeks before the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Stewart Rhodes addressed a crowd of MAGA loyalists and far-right activists who had gathered for a rally on the National Mall. Rhodes, the founder of the anti-government extremist group the Oath Keepers, had a message for the president: "Show the world who the traitors are, and then use the Insurrection Act to drop the hammer on them.”<
“He needs to know from you that you are with him, [and] that if he does not do it now while he is commander in chief, we’re going to have to do it ourselves later, in a much more desperate, much more bloody war,” Rhodes threatened.
Following the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, Rhodes was eventually found guilty of seditious conspiracy for the role that he and his organization played in fomenting and carrying out the attack, for which he was sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Upon his return to the Oval Office in 2025, President Donald Trump issued sweeping pardons for nearly every person who had been arrested, charged, or convicted for their roles in the insurrection, but Rhodes was among the few who only received a commutation of his sentence, meaning that he was released from prison but his criminal conviction remains on his record.
Since his release, Rhodes has been pushing to be granted a full pardon, which is reportedly being considered by Trump's far-right pardon attorney, Ed Martin.
Last week, Rhodes appeared on a program hosted by right-wing conspiracy theorist Dave Daubenmire to discuss his situation.
Insisting that Jan. 6 was actually a "manipulated event to manufacture their 'Reichstag fire' moment to distract and to deflect attention from their own coup," Rhodes argued that Trump must issue pardons to him and the others in order to finally correct the "false narrative" about Jan. 6.
"There's 14 of us in total, but they're all Oath Keepers or Proud Boys," Rhodes said of those who received commutations but not pardons. "What that means is your term of prison has ended, it's like time served, your let out but you're still a felon. I'm still a felon. I can't own a gun. I can't vote in Texas. In fact, I lost all my veteran's benefits."
"It's just disgusting," Rhodes continued. "By commuting us only—and we're grateful to be out of prison—but the problem is it helps sustain the false narrative because people seeing us [say], 'Well, they , they didn't get a pardon so they must have really done something wrong.'"
"Now that Ed Martin, thank God, is the new pardon attorney, we've put in pardon applications," he said. "All of us need to be pardoned. I think there's either 11 or 12 of us left who still need a pardon and I would encourage people to support everyone—no man left behind—every one of those guys need to get a pardon."
