Stewart Rhodes sentenced to 18 years.

Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes was sentenced to 18 years in prison Thursday in the first punishments to be handed down for seditious conspiracy in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. U.S. prosecutors asked for up to 25 years in prison and the longest sentence by far in the rioting to deter future acts of domestic terrorism, arguing Rhodes played a significant role in spreading doubt about the 2020 presidential election and led more than 20 other Americans to seek to use violence against the government to thwart the transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden.

Of course it’s really Trump who should be in the slammer.

Rhodes and followers dressed in combat-style gear converged on the Capitol after staging an “arsenal” of weapons at nearby hotels, ready to take up arms at Rhodes’s direction, prosecutors said. Rhodes did not enter the building but was in contact with “ground team” leader Meggs, an auto dealer manager, just before Meggsled a line of members in military-style tactical gear up the East Capitol steps, where they helped a crowd force entry.

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[P]rosecutors presented evidence that after networks declared the election for Biden on Nov. 7, 2020, Rhodes asked a “Friends of Stone” chat group — that included Stone and Proud Boys leader Henry “Enrique” Tarrio — “What’s the plan?” and shared a Serbian academic’s proposal for storming Congress. Over the next two months, Rhodes amplified Trump’s bogus stolen election claims and used his platform as one of the extremist anti-government movement’s most visible leaders to urge followers to be ready for an “armed rebellion,” including in two open letters to Trump and a personal message intended for him pressing the president to use the military to hold on to power against Democratic opponents.

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“We will have to rise up in insurrection (rebellion)” if Trump does not act, Rhodes texted one associate on Dec. 10. Four days after Jan. 6, Rhodes was recorded telling another that if Trump was “just gonna let himself be removed illegally, then we should have brought rifles,” and, “We could have fixed it right then and there. I’d hang f—-ing Pelosi from the lamppost,” referring to then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Trump is campaigning to be president again.