Oath Keepers Member Testifies Far-Right Extremist Group Had Massive Cache of Weapons for January 6 Capitol Attack

A member of the far-right extremist group Oath Keepers testified against its founder Stewart Rhodes and four associates on Wednesday.

Terry Cummings revealed that the group had a massive cache of weapons stashed in a Virginia hotel room. Rhodes and other members of the extremist group were on trial for seditious conspiracy, though several members were cooperating with the government in the case against its leaders.

One of those was Cummings, who testified that he contributed to the group's so-called quick reaction force they had staged at the hotel outside of Washington in case they needed weapons.

According to the Associated Press, Cummings also showed the jury an AR-15 firearm and an orange box for ammunition that he contributed.

"I had not seen that many weapons in one location since I was in the military," said Cummings, a combat veteran who joined the Oath Keepers in Florida two years ago.

Cummings was the first Oath Keepers member present during the January 6 Capitol insurrection to testify during the trial.

He told the jury that he traveled to Washington on January 6 with other Oath Keepers to be part of a VIP security detail for former President Donald Trump's rally at the White House Ellipse before the riot.

He noted that he saw it as a chance to express his First Amendment rights and personally see a president speak, which he had never experienced yet. He said he thought the weapon was more of a "show of force" and was not intended to be used offensively.

Cummings noted that he and fellow Oath Keepers kept the weapons in the hotel room in Virginia because they knew that bringing them to Washington D.C. would be illegal.

Oath Keepers Ready to Hand Out Weapons to Extremists During January 6

The Justice Department alleged that the stockpile held in the Virginia hotel was to aid in an armed rebellion against the government and stop the peaceful transfer of power from Donald Trump to President-elect Joe Biden.

Prosecutors said during the trial that teams of Oath Keepers guarded the arsenal and were prepared to hand them out to extremists in the capital if needed.

This weapons cache was used as the centerpiece for the DOJ's case against Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and co-defendants Kelly Meggs, Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins, and Thomas Caldwell.

According to CBS News, they are on trial for multiple felony charges. The most serious of these charges is seditious conspiracy, and all four have pleaded "not guilty" to this charge.

Prosecution Reveals Encrypted Signal Messages Between Stewart Rhodes and Regional Oath Keepers Leaders

According to Politico, DOJ prosecutors revealed several encrypted signal messages between Stewart Rhodes and the Oath Keepers' regional leaders as they organized their plans for January 6.

Those messages showed that their goal was to prevent Joe Biden from taking office, with Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, which the group believes would allow them to stop Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 presidential elections.

One message, which Georgia Oath Keeper Brian Ulrich sent on December 20, 2020, said, "Trump acts now maybe a few hundred radicals die trying to burn down cities." He then added, "Trump sits on his hands, Biden wins, millions die resisting the death of the 1st and 2nd amendment."

Ulrich has pleaded guilty to his seditious conspiracy charge, though Rhodes and his associates have continued to assert their innocence.

They claimed that the trip was all about providing security to VIP attendees of Trump's speech at the Ellipse. They also argued that they never managed to deploy those weapons in Washington.

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Rick Martin

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