Elmer Stewart Rhodes III
Overview
Elmer Stewart Rhodes III is a former U.S. Army paratrooper and Yale Law School graduate who founded Oath Keepers in 2009 and served as its national leader.
January 6, 2021 and conviction
On January 13, 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice charged Rhodes with seditious conspiracy and related federal offenses in connection with a documented plot to use force to oppose the lawful transfer of presidential power around January 6, 2021. On November 29, 2022, a federal jury convicted Rhodes of seditious conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding, and tampering with documents. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison.
Clemency
On January 20, 2025, a presidential proclamation commuted Rhodes's sentence to time served. Unlike some other January 6 defendants who received a full pardon under the same proclamation, Rhodes's clemency was a commutation: his underlying seditious-conspiracy conviction was not vacated, reversed, or pardoned, and remains on the record. He was released from custody on January 21, 2025.