The Oath Keepers founder met with Republican Rep. Gus Bilirakis of Florida to lobby for a pardon for fellow Oath Keeper and January 6 rioter Jeremy Brown, who was sentenced to seven years in prison on weapons charges.

Rhodes and Tarrio were among the most prominent defendants from January 6 and had received some of the harshest punishments.

The move, in effect, validated the far-right leader’s defiant claim that his criminal prosecution was a kind of political persecution.