Federal Protection of “Oath Keepers” Kingpin Stewart Rhodes Breaks The Entire Capitol “Insurrection” Lie Wide Open
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The Justice Department argues that Stewart Rhodes both substantially organized and activated an imputed plan to use violence, on 1/6, in real-time, through a series of encrypted Signal messages beginning at 1:38 p.m., as Trump concluded his rally speech on the National Mall, and 62 minutes before Oath Keepers lieutenants allegedly formed a “military stack” to rush the Capitol doors.

These facts alone, as alleged, are more than legally sufficient to secure an indictment of Stewart Rhodes. We will walk you through the mountains of direct and circumstantial evidence built on top of these allegations, but readers must understand this: the only reason Stewart Rhodes is not in jail *right now* is because of a deliberate decision by the Justice Department to protect him.

Indeed, it is unclear whether the FBI has even sought to search Stewart Rhodes’s residence, personal belongings, or electronic devices, other than a single iPhone allegedly seized on the streets from agents in unmarked FBI vehicles in late April (since returned). For reasons discussed below, there is good reason to suspect the FBI will pursue a tightly controlled and very limited scope of investigation into Stewart Rhodes,. Beyond that narrow scope, they may not want the information they are likely to find.

Why doesn’t anyone at the FBI or DOJ want him?

If 1/6 was an “insurrection,” why protect the one man who, more than any other individual referenced in the charging documents of the 530+ open criminal cases, comes closest to the media’s ravenous description of a “lead insurrectionist?”

Is it possible that the Oath Keepers, the most prominent antigovernment group in the United States, has been run, in effect, by the United States government itself — and nobody has mentioned it until now?

Revolver News generated tremendous discussion and controversy with our previous piece exploring the possibility that some of the unindicted individuals referred to in the 1/6 charging documents may be undercover agents or informants.

With this piece, we intend to focus this discussion on a single individual, Person One; i.e., Stewart Rhodes — the leader of the Oath Keepers.

If it turns out that Stewart Rhodes has had a relationship with the federal government, the implications would be nothing short of staggering.

For Stewart Rhodes is not just a senior member of the Oath Keepers, he is the Oath Keepers.  Given the fact that the Oath Keepers are the major paramilitary organization imputed (by government and media alike) to be responsible for the most serious and egregious elements of the so-called 1/6 insurrection, it follows that it would not only be fair, but necessary to conclude that in an essential respect the 1/6 event was planned and orchestrated by elements of the government itself.

In other words, 1/6 was not the result of an intelligence failure as FBI Director Christopher Wray, the US Senate, and the media tells us. Rather, 1/6 was the result of an intelligence set-up.

The following questions should be shouted from every megaphone, every street corner, and every Congressional lectern until the American people get full and complete answers:

• Does the FBI now, or has it ever, maintained a formal or informal relationship or point of contact with Stewart Rhodes, whether directly or indirectly, including through intermediaries?
• Do any other Federal counterintelligence equities, whether in military, intelligence or law enforcement, including but not limited to Army Counterintelligence, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), or otherwise, maintain or have they ever maintained a formal or informal relationship with Stewart Rhodes, whether directly or indirectly, including through intermediaries?
• If such a confidential relationship did exist between Stewart Rhodes and one or more U.S. counterintelligence equities, how do the FBI and other responsible agencies reconcile the enormous gravity of this omission from their previous deflections, non-answers, and boilerplate that they had “no actionable intelligence” before 1/6?
• If such a confidential relationship did exist between Stewart Rhodes and one or more U.S. counterintelligence equities, does this explain the FBI and Justice Department’s failure to pursue criminal actions against Stewart Rhodes in similarly high-profile “right-wing conspiracy plots” in which Rhodes appears to have played a similarly driving role?
• More specifically, did the FBI or any other U.S. counterintelligence equities maintain a discrete or confidential relationship with Stewart Rhodes during the 2014 Bundy Ranch standoff? Was this fact dispositive in the Justice Department’s decision to charge 19 defendants — including certain of Stewart Rhodes’s alleged Oath Keepers underlings — for conspiracy to obstruct a legal proceeding, and to spare Rhodes of similar charges?
• Has the FBI even procured a search warrant for Stewart Rhodes’s personal residence and home electronics? If so, on what dates and what specific categories of evidence were sought?
• If Stewart Rhodes is subsequently arrested after the date of this report (given the pressure these revelations are likely to generate), how does the Justice Department explain its failure to indict Stewart Rhodes on conspiracy charges for nearly six months, when its declared purpose for seeking bail denial for simple trespassers was the DOJ’s stated need to prevent “the immediate danger to the community” defendants allegedly posed? Given that multiple Oath Keepers were charged before the January 20th inauguration citing the need to stop their “immediate danger,” why did the DOJ not file immediate charges against Rhodes, and then make a superseding indictment later in time, as is their routine practice in 1/6 cases?

Stewart Rhodes and the “Shock and Awe” Standard

Before we turn to Stewart Rhodes’ statements and behavior leading up to and during 1/6, it is important to keep in mind the so-called “shock and awe” standard of prosecution applied to those actually indicted for 1/6 related crimes.

Lead 1/6 prosecutor Michael Sherwin explains this “Shock and Awe” standard in his own words:

Here is a partial transcript of Shwerin’s interview above:


In this article we focus our scrutiny and our suspicion on one individual, Person One, otherwise known as Stewart Rhodes, the leader of the paramilitary Oath Keepers group. In keeping with the structure of our previous report, we will examine the as-of-yet unindicted Mr. Rhodes’ actions and statements in light of the Shock and Awe standard of prosecution described above.
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As we conclude this section, it is important to take stock of the material presented so far. Given the above selection of Stewart Rhodes’s actions and words leading up to and on 1/6, and given that Rhodes is the leader of the major militia group associated with 1/6 — why no indictment for Rhodes?

This pressing and decisive question cannot be considered in isolation. Instead, as we have argued throughout this series, it must be considered in light of the maximally severe standard of “Shock and Awe” prosecution applied to those indicted for 1/6 crimes. After having looked at Rhodes’s statements and actions leading up to 1/6, and noting that a sandwich shop owner George Tanios faces 60 years for the utterance “no, no, not yet,” is it not bizarre that Mr. Rhodes hasn’t yet been indicted?

At the time of writing, countless Americans are being held in prison under abusive and unjust conditions for minor if not non-existent offenses related to 1/6. The reason for such severity is the notion that 1/6 was an attempt at an insurrection, an organized and planned attempt to “siege” the Capitol and obstruct the healthy functioning of our democracy. And yet, when we examine the evidence, it appears that the overwhelming share of “insurrectionist” words and actions associated with 1/6 come from the Oath Keepers organization. How then do we explain hundreds of Ordinary Joes rotting in prison and George Tanios facing 60 years in light of the leader and founder of the Oath Keepers, Stewart Rhodes, being charged with nothing?

Now is the time to emphasize another caveat. While we strenuously disagree with Rhodes’s rhetoric about “bloody civil war” and insurrections, the purpose of this is not to take issue with or criticize all of the Oath Keepers’ beliefs. Some of the Oath Keepers’ stated beliefs seem very reasonable — their stated resistance to totalitarian overreach, skepticism about the 2020 Presidential election, support for the 2nd Amendment and so forth.

Precisely because many patriots will find much of the Oath Keepers’ beliefs reasonable and attractive, we have no doubt that many members of the Oath Keepers organization are good, well-meaning patriots (and many veterans) who simply found the wrong outlet and organization to fight against the corrupt ruling class of our country.

We sympathize with these patriots and the position they’re in. But the reality is that it is very unlikely that any organization or militia with the stated purpose of the Oath Keepers to recruit law enforcement officers and veterans can help but become, in effect, a honeypot trap. And this is what we believe the Oath Keepers is at the highest organizational level, and we believe the overwhelming share of evidence indicates that Stewart Rhodes’s primary purpose is to fulfill this deceptive function on behalf of elements within the government.

Finally, we re-emphasize our earlier caveat. The purpose of this expose is not to target Mr. Rhodes personally nor are we interested in him being indicted. Our interest is in the federal infiltration, involvement and foreknowledge of 1/6.

In the following section, we will draw upon the information above among other important details and observations to make a more focused legal case for conspiracy that could be the basis of the indictment of Mr. Rhodes. The notion that it would be difficult to put together such an indictment is simply not sustainable. Again, the purpose here is not to encourage Rhodes’ indictment per se but to draw careful attention to the by now unavoidable conclusion that he’s being protected. The following section is especially important  for the army of regime media “fact checkers” who inevitably will descend like hyenas upon this groundbreaking, dangerous, and yet vitally important investigative piece.  (read more)