He has also been disbarred.
...Elmer Stewart Rhodes, founder of the Oath Keepers, was arrested in Texas this week for allegedly committing seditious conspiracy related to the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. He had been a practicing lawyer in Montana before his disbarment in 2015.
Before coming to Montana
Rhodes was born in California and joined the military after graduating high school. Army records show he was discharged due to a severe injury during training. According to The Atlantic, in 1993 Rhodes dropped a loaded handgun which caused the injury to his left eye. Following the incident, he enrolled in college, graduating summa cum laude from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, and then attended Yale Law School where he was an accomplished student.
He worked for former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, while in Washington D.C. before working as a clerk for Arizona Supreme Court Justice Michael Ryan.
Rhodes formed the Oath Keepers in 2009 after Paul's failed 2008 bid to be the Republican presidential nominee.
In 2010, Rhodes would relocate his law firm to Montana where he was licensed to practice law. Court filings had listed Montana addresses for Rhodes in Big Arm, Kalispell and Trego over the years.
Road to Disbarment ...
On April 15, 2014, he failed to appear by telephone for a status conference for a case with Jones. At the time, Rhodes was at the Cliven Bundy standoff with the United States Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in Nevada. Oath Keepers were there supporting Bundy who had not been paying grazing fees on federal land.
Disbarment by the Montana Supreme Court
On April 28, 2014, U.S. District Court Judge David Campbell of the United States District Court for the District of Arizona filed an ethics complaint against Rhodes for appearing in court without a license to do so. On May 12, 2014, Roth lodged a complaint against Rhodes, stating that he had provided incompetent representation and had abandoned Roth in his civil suit in federal court. Rhodes did not respond to either complaint.
On July 30, 2014, the Montana Commission on Practice (COP) told Rhodes to personally appear before the COP on October 16, 2014, in Kalispell to address the complaints. He did not show up to the meeting....
