Tonight, Attorney General Merrick Garland says that tireless work by his Justice Department helped secure the seditious conspiracy conviction against the leader of the Oath Keepers, Stuart Rhodes. We have an exclusive interview right now with Rhodes attorneys James Lee Bright and Philip Linda.
Sarah, CNN Sarah Seidner is also back with me to take part in this conversation. Thank you both for joining us this evening. James, I want to start with you. You have said this was a fair trial, that government prosecutors, quote, took us to task, which is quite honest.
So how significant do you think it is that Rhodes was found guilty of seditious conspiracy? A rare conviction. It is a rare conviction. Thank you for having us. I appreciate it. I do overall believe that we got a fair trial.
I think the jury stayed out three days and as you had to guess previously, this evening detail, they kind of came back with a very interesting selection of not guilty verdicts and guilty verdicts. I think that shows the attention to detail that they had and the attention that they gave to the verdicts and the trial itself.
The government did take us to the task. This was a brutal trial for all parties. Long, extensive, lots of evidence. And one person I want to compliment is Judge Medal. Incredibly intelligent man and I love his tone and demeanor in the courtroom and how he ran the courtroom.
In terms of Mr. Rhodes and his conviction for seditious conspiracy, I would respectfully still state that while I respect the jury's return on that, based on the evidence that I feel was presented and what was given to the jury, I disagree with their finding, on.
That was specifically right after January 6. Philip Rhodes said that, quote, his only regret he made in a recording that was later played by the government. Let's listen to that only regret. My only regret is I should have brought rise.
I'll tell you what, President Trump is going to do the right thing, then I agree with Ron. The thing to do is not going to do the right thing. We should have let him be removed illegally. Then you should have brought rifles.
Should have brought rifles. He regretted not bringing rifles. Philip, does he have any regrets now? Yes. Mr. Rhodes regrets that some of the Oath Keepers went into the building. They were not directed to go into the building.
And the evidence came out and trial that those people that went into the building were on a mission at the time. And he regrets that the officers got hurt. They weren't hurt by his people, but the officers in the building did get hurt by people in the crowd.
And that is a regret of his. But as the evidence showed, he didn't direct anybody to go in. There was no plan to go in. And the few that did so of their own volition. All right, I want to bring in my colleague, Sarah Seiden.
She has a question for you, Sarah. I do. James, I want to start with you. I sat in this trial watching you and two other attorneys took this very difficult case. There was, like you said, like a mountain of evidence.
But Mr. Rhodes testified in his defense, standing by this baseless claim that the 2020 election was, in his words, unconstitutional, and he wanted to testify. That seemed to be made very clear. Can you tell us whether or not you tried to dissuade him or if you regret that he testified on his behalf, which is also a very rare thing dealing with a very rare charge?
Absolutely. Sarah, good to see you again. When Mr. Linda and I were first hired on this case, on January 24, we went and met with Mr. Rhodes. He set out two preconditions for us to represent him. One, he would testify at his trial no matter what.
Two, he would never accept a plea offer. That's been made clear in the case, made clear to the court. So it's nothing that we could have dissuaded him from doing, to begin with. Male, educated lawyer.
He's very intelligent, whether an individual chooses to agree or disagree with his ethos and his belief systems, and we did with that kind of client what was necessary. We admonished him thoroughly as to the pros and the cons legally and strategy-wise, regarding waiving the Fifth Amendment and testifying.
So in his case, it was never an option. It was not something that we were going to be able to keep him from doing in terms of the unconstitutional nature of the election. Mr. Rhodes has done an enormous amount of research, and he'll point you to article two of the Constitution which requires the legislatures of each of the 50 states to approve modifications.
All right, thank you. Yeah. Mr. Linda, we're hearing a little bit of the testimony that we heard from Stewart Rhodes at the time, and I don't know if we still have Mr. Linder up. Okay. James, you're back.
All right, I do have a question here because you have said that you were going to appeal, and this is for either you, Philip, or you, James. You have said you're going to appeal. On what grounds? Since you said that you felt like this was a fair trial and this jury came back with a verdict you didn't agree with, but that it was fair.
And I'll address this issue then. Thank you. Thank you, Sarah, for the question. It's a great question. We feel that we spend a lot of time over a week selecting a jury that we thought was a fair jury for the district.
And based on their verdict, you can see that they've come down with they individually went through each defendant in each count and rendered separate decisions for each of those, which is what they're supposed to do.
So we feel and they spend a lot of time doing those several days. So we feel that we got a fair trial in that respect. However, as you know and as you watched, there were things that the government presented in evidence that we objected to, which we feel shouldn't have come into evidence.
There were things that we wanted to present. The judge, Maddie, and I think he did a fabulous job. He prevented us from presenting to the jury. So the jury didn't get everything they needed to get to weigh everything.
They got a lot of evidence, as you saw, they got tons. But there were things that they were prevented from seeing from us and particular witnesses that we wanted to present that we were unable to. So based on that, we don't think that part is fair.
It was a remarkable trial. Thank you both for joining us tonight. Thank you for your honesty, James Lee Bright, Philip Linder, and, of course, my brilliant colleague, Sarah Seidner.