Fresh from being freed by President Trump’s massive pardon grants, two of the country’s most notorious far-right leaders — Enrique Terrio of the Proud Boys and Stuart Rhodes of the Oath Keepers militia — spoke out this week.
While the men avoided any announcements about the future of their devastated organizations, they unreservedly said they wanted Mr. Trump to prosecute them in connection with the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Take revenge for leaving.
Before Mr. Trump offered them clemency on Monday night, both men were serving lengthy prison terms — Mr. Terrio for 22 years and Mr. Rhodes for 18 — for their roles in the Capitol storming of the coup plot. On the punishments of The charges against them and the sentences they received were among the most serious of any of the nearly 1,600 people charged in connection with the January 6 case.
Perhaps for this reason, his remarks, addressed to a largely friendly audience, were couched in a tone of cautious belligerence.
He worried about the kinds of organizations he led that would strike once another Trump administration took over. But he clearly echoed claims by the president and some of his allies that those who sought to hold Mr. Trump and the Jan. 6 rioters accountable should themselves face some form of punishment.
“Success,” said Mr. Terrio, “is going to be revenged.”
Mr Terrio made the comments to Alex Jones, a pro-Trump conspiracy theorist and owner of the news outlet Infowars. He called into Mr Jones’ show hours after he was released from a federal prison in Louisiana and immediately thanked Mr Trump “for helping us through these difficult times and for releasing me.”
“Twenty-two years — that’s not a short sentence,” he said. “This is the rest of my life. So Trump literally gave me my life back.
Mr. Terrio then launched a sustained attack on the criminal case in Washington’s federal district court where he and three of his lieutenants were found guilty of treason – a crime that requires prosecutors to prove that the defendants used violent force against the government.
He claimed that the jury was biased and that the proceedings in Washington were unfair.
“I think they didn’t care about the evidence,” he said of the jurors who convicted him. “They cared about putting Trump supporters in jail.”
The Proud Boys played a central role in confronting police at the Capitol on January 6 and encouraging other rioters to breach police lines. While Mr. Terrio was not in Washington that day, prosecutors say he helped his compatriots prepare for street fights and kept in touch with them while the mob — led by Proud The boys were—surrounded the Capitol.
In his first hours of independence, he was also focused on seeking revenge against those who investigated and prosecuted the events of January 6. “Now it’s our turn,” announced Mr. Terrio.
“The people who did it, they need to feel the heat,” he said. “They need to be put behind bars and prosecuted.”
At a White House news conference on Tuesday, Mr. Trump was asked whether far-right groups like the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers would find a place in the political conversation now that they could pardon their members or commute their sentences. Given the extensive mitigation efforts.
“Well, we’ll have to see,” Mr. Trump replied. “He has been pardoned. I thought his sentences were ridiculous and excessive.
Mr. Rhodes also said he was looking to return to a local jail in Washington on Tuesday afternoon that has held several defendants for years on Jan. 6 and protested the federal prosecution. has served as the emotional center of Rioter
He said, for example, that he hopes Kash Patel, Mr. Trump’s pick to run the FBI, will “get in there and clean house” at the bureau. He also accused those who oversaw his trial of breaking the law.
“The first thing that has to happen is that prosecutors who subpoena perjury — it’s a felony — need to be prosecuted for their crimes,” Mr. Rhodes said.
At his sentencing hearing in 2023, Mr. Rhodes likened himself to Soviet-era defector Alexander Solzhenitsyn and the troubled protagonist of Kafka’s novel “The Trial,” saying he was “a political prisoner.”
DC was equally unrepentant outside the jail. When asked how the date should be remembered on Jan. 6, he said, “As a day of patriotism — that we stood up for our country because we knew the election was stolen.”
As for any regrets, he said he has none, adding, “because we did the right thing.”
On Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Rhodes was spotted at a Dunkin’ Donuts in the Longworth House office building next to the Capitol.
The Jan. 6 indictment devastated the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers as federal agents across the country arrested scores of people from both groups and prosecutors tried and convicted dozens of their members — often from within the organizations. With the help of turncoats and informers.
The Oathkeepers in particular can barely be said to exist as a viable entity anymore. And while the Proud Boys disbanded its national leadership group — known as the Elders Chapter — under the weight of the Jan. 6 investigation, many of the group’s local chapters remained active.
Indeed, on Inauguration Day, rank-and-file Proud Boys descended on Washington in numbers for the first time since Jan. 6, marching with banners congratulating Mr. Trump on his return to the White House. The display of presence on the streets – especially the streets of Washington – suggested that some within the Proud Boys wanted a public display of power.
Mr. Terrio, however, was somewhat cautious about the group’s future, giving his standard response to the organization.
“I think the future of the club is going to be what it’s always been,” he said, “just a group of men who love America, hang out and drink beer and protect Trump supporters from attack. “
As for his own role in the group, he responded with a typical wink.
“I have a proposal for the mainstream media,” he said. “They should stop calling me the ex-Proud Boys leader.”
Mr. Rhodes was equally funny – though perhaps not quite as smug.
He said he didn’t know what the future held for Oathkeepers, admitting that “I might decide to end my Spurs.”
Anyway, he went on, he had other things to think about at the moment. When a reporter outside the D.C. jail asked him what he planned to do first when he got home, his answer was quick and simple.
“I’m going to report to my probation officer,” he said.
