- Oath Keepers founder Elmer Stewart Rhodes fired his initial defense team just weeks before trial.
- Rhodes hired a new lawyer and asked for a delay of his September 26 trial on January 6 charges.
Citing a "breakdown" in communication, Oath Keepers founder Elmer Stewart Rhodes has cut ties with his initial defense team and hired a new lawyer as he prepares to stand trial later this month in one of the highest-profile prosecutions stemming from the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, according to a new court filing.
In a 20-page court brief, Rhodes said his last-minute change in legal representation warrants a three-month delay of his September 26 trial on a seditious conspiracy charge and other accusations connected to the Capitol attack. Rhodes, a Yale Law School graduate and former leader of the Oath Keepers, also indicated that he would seek to face charges alone and have his case severed from the four other members of the far-right group who are set to stand trial alongside him later this month.
His new lawyer, Edward L. Tarpley Jr, said Rhodes "has had a complete, or near-complete breakdown of communication between himself and his prior counselors." Tarpley said Rhodes has "relieved and terminated" those Texas-based lawyers, Phillip A. Linder and James Lee Bright, adding that they "do not object" to his move to replace them in the case.
Bright declined to comment; Linder did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
It was not immediately clear how the shakeup of Rhodes' defense team, just three weeks before the start of trial, would affect the proceedings in Washington, DC, court. In the buildup to trial, lawyers for the accused Oath Keepers have sought delays to avoid the publicity around the House committee investigating the January 6 attack, which is expected to release a report this month on its findings.
But Judge Amit Mehta, an Obama appointee presiding over the prosecution, has rejected those requests. Shortly after Tarpley's filing on Tuesday, Mehta ordered the Justice Department and Rhodes' former defense counsel to file any response by 2 pm Wednesday.
In Tuesday's court filing, Tarpley said Rhodes is "facing potential life imprisonment in the most serious case" among the more than 850 prosecutions stemming from the Capitol attack. In Washington, DC, he added, Rhodes confronts a "a hostile jury pool that is some 95% Democrat."
"Rhodes has not heard from his attorneys in over three weeks. Rhodes has not been visited by his attorneys in almost two months. Rhodes has called his prior attorneys repeatedly but they do not answer," Tarpley wrote.
"Rhodes," he added, "is entitled to zealous advocates who follow through with stated plans to advance defense strategy, and who communicate regularly with Rhodes in order to help Rhodes defend himself."
The FBI arrested Rhodes in January on charges he orchestrated a wide-ranging plot to violently storm the Capitol and disrupt the certification of the 2020 election results. In court records, prosecutors alleged that the plot involved stashing weapons at a hotel and having s0-called "quick reaction forces" on standby outside Washington, DC.