Judge bars Oath Keepers founder from entering Washington without court approval

A US judge barred Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes from entering Washington DC without the court’s approval.

It comes after President Donald Trump commuted the far-right group leader’s 18-year prison sentence for orchestrating an attack on the US Capitol four years ago.

US District Judge Amit Mehta issued the order two days after Rhodes visited the Capitol, where he met with at least one legislator, chatted with others and defended his actions during a mob’s attack on January 6 2021.

Rhodes was released from a Maryland prison a day earlier.

Judge Mehta’s order applies to seven other people who were convicted of charges in the riot that halted the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory over Mr Trump.

The order also prohibits them from entering the Capitol building or surrounding grounds without the court’s permission.

Rhodes was convicted of seditious conspiracy in one of the most serious cases brought by the Justice Department.

He was found guilty of orchestrating a weeks-long plot that culminated in his followers attacking the US Capitol in a desperate bid to keep Mr Trump, a Republican, in power.

Rhodes did not enter the building on January 6 and has said it was “stupid” that members of the Oath Keepers did.

“My guys blundered through doors,” he insisted during his visit to Capitol Hill earlier this week.

Mr Trump’s sweeping clemency order on Monday upended the largest prosecution in Justice Department history, freeing from prison people seen on camera viciously attacking police as well as leaders of far-right extremist groups convicted of orchestrating violent plots to stop the peaceful transfer of power after his election loss.

Mr Trump has defended the pardons, saying the defendants had “already served years in prison” in conditions he described as “disgusting” and “inhumane”.

Rhodes said during his visit to the Capitol earlier this week that he’s now urging Trump for a full pardon.

He stopped at a Dunkin’ Donuts inside the House office building in the Capitol complex before delivering a lengthy defence of himself and his actions.

“I didn’t lead anything. So why should I feel responsible for that?” Rhodes said.

James Lee Bright, an attorney who defended Rhodes at trial, told The Associated Press on Friday that he is concerned that criticism of the pardons from judges on Washington’s federal court means his client and others on supervised release will be monitored “with a very heavy hand”.

Several judges have since spoken out about the pardons and efforts to rewrite the history of the January 6 insurrection by a mob of Trump supporters.

US District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who presided over Mr Trump’s election interference case before its dismissal, said the pardons can’t change the “tragic truth” about the attack.

“It cannot whitewash the blood, feces and terror that the mob left in its wake,” Judge Chutkan wrote in court papers earlier this week.

“And it cannot repair the jagged breach in America’s sacred tradition of peacefully transitioning power.”

Judge Mehta has said pardoning Rhodes would be “frightening”.

“The notion that Stewart Rhodes could be absolved of his actions is frightening and ought to be frightening to anyone who cares about democracy in this country,” the judge said from the bench last month.

Rhodes’ lawyer said the judge’s comments show that the January 6 defendants could not get a fair trial in Washington.

Nearly 1,600 people were charged with Capitol riot-related crimes. More than 1,000 of them pleaded guilty.

Approximately 250 others were convicted by a judge or jury after trials.

Over 1,100 were sentenced, with more than 700 receiving a term of imprisonment ranging from several days to 22 years.