The final report of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol heavily focuses on Donald Trump’s role as a driver of events that day.
But evidence reviewed by staff investigators points to a coordinated effort by high-level Trump allies that directed the activities of the militant groups like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys that stormed the Capitol.
Testimony by Kellye SoRelle, a former prosecutor from Texas who is associated with the Oath Keepers, to the January 6th Committee illuminates the role of the “Friends of Stone” Signal chat in coordinating activities of militant groups tasked with providing security at Stop the Steal rallies, who then participated in the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6.
SoRelle, who sat for deposition over the course of more than nine hours spread over two days last April, told investigators she believes she was added to the “Friends of Stone” chat in early November 2020 by Jason Sullivan, a digital media strategist who had worked on the Trump campaign for Roger Stone during the 2016 election. Stone is a longtime Trump confidant and the namesake of the Signal chat.
Sullivan is a relatively obscure figure in the sprawling investigation into the effort to overturn the 2020 election, which unfolded through a series of dramatic hearings held by the January 6th Committee last summer. His name doesn’t appear in the committee’s 845-page final report, although he was deposed last August. But SoRelle’s testimony indicates that Sullivan acted as a convener, helping to bridge the efforts of high-level Trump allies like Stone, his one-time mentor, and the militant groups.
SoRelle is currently under indictment for conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds and obstruction of justice for her role in the Jan. 6 attack.
SoRelle told the committee that while she was in Detroit volunteering to investigate election irregularities around the time of the Nov. 3, 2020 election, Sullivan contacted her to ask her to follow up on specific investigative leads in Michigan. SoRelle said that the basis for her belief that Sullivan added her to the chat is due to the fact that she received an invitation to join shortly after speaking with him.
“And I end up basically on the phone with Jason Sullivan,” SoRelle said. “Then I get added to this Friends of Stone stuff at this point. And I really have no relationship with any of them, other than they’re just trying to, like — they’re basically — because I’m on the ground, they’re trying to incorporate me in the loop, so to speak.”
Sullivan invoked his Fifth Amendment privileges based on a good-faith belief that telling the truth might expose him to criminal prosecution when asked by the committee who enlisted him to track election activities in Michigan, and who put him in contact with SoRelle. During his deposition, an investigator told Sullivan that committee staff understood that Sullivan was the administrator of the “Friends of Stone” chat. Sullivan again invoked the Fifth Amendment.
SoRelle had gotten involved with the Oath Keepers in the spring of 2020 through the anti-lockdown protests in Texas, and members of the far-right group went to Detroit to provide security for her while she was investigating election issues. SoRelle told the committee that by the time she joined “Friends of Stone,” around Nov. 10, Oath Keepers founder and executive director Stewart Rhodes was already a member of the chat. SoRelle said she believes that InfoWars host Alex Jones brought Rhodes into Stone’s circle. (In a statement provided to Raw Story in September 2022, Stone’s attorney said that “Stone has never met, talked to, or otherwise interacted with Mr. Rhodes.”)
Sullivan invoked the Fifth Amendment in response to questions about whether he ever came into contact with the Oath Keepers and about whether he was aware of Stone having a relationship with Rhodes from the January 6th Committee.
SoRelle told the committee that she perceived the “Friends of Stone” chat as a hub for coordinating the Stop the Steal rallies, as well as collecting “data” on election irregularities. The roster of members of the “Friends of Stone” chat also included Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio, who is currently on trial for seditious conspiracy for his role in the Jan. 6 attack.
Sullivan remained behind the scenes throughout the series of rallies in state capitols and Washington, DC leading up to the Jan. 6 attack. But on Dec. 30 he appeared on a conference call that included members of 1st Amendment Praetorian and QAnon followers. During that call, which was recorded by a woman named Staci Burk, Sullivan called on Trump supporters to “descend on the Capitol,” while indicating he was aware of plans by militant groups to prevent Joe Biden from taking office as president.
“There’s dates floating around for some of the people in the militia, okay?” Sullivan told participants on the call, as previously reported by Raw Story. “They will not allow Biden to go into the White House. That’s a fact. I’m not part of that. I don’t applaud that. I don’t endorse it. I don’t encourage it. But I do have my ear to the railroad. We have all the real-time social media intelligence you could imagine.
“And I don’t see any other way around it,” Sullivan continued. “Because, first of all, they’re not going to allow any election fraud to take place. It’s not gonna happen. Biden will never be in that White House. That’s my promise to each and every one of you.”
Sullivan again pleaded the Fifth Amendment when asked by the committee what he meant by “descend on the Capitol” and whether he was referring to the Oath Keepers when he mentioned “the militia.” Sullivan told the committee he didn’t recall who invited him to speak on the conference call.
Sullivan testified that he had expected “peaceful protests” at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and was surprised by the violence that day.
“I think it’s appalling what took place, you know,” Sullivan testified, when asked by the committee how he felt about Jan. 6. “Some of these Proud Boy folks I think were nefarious. I think some of these Oath Keeper folks were nefarious.”
Stone has attempted to distance himself from Sullivan. In an April 2022 letter shared with the press, Stone’s lawyer threatened Sullivan with legal action if he did not stop publicly representing himself as “Roger Stone’s senior social media advisor,” while acknowledging that Sullivan worked for Stone’s consulting business for 30 days in 2016. In that letter, attorney Grant Smith also accused Sullivan of leaking his own appearance before a grand jury as a witness against Stone in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.
SoRelle told the January 6th Committee during her April 2022 deposition that Sullivan told her during their conversation in November 2020 that “Stone was mad at him over” his grand jury testimony.
“But he tells me that he’s basically trying to make amends with Roger Stone during that time,” SoRelle added.
SoRelle’s testimony received a brief spotlight during the sixth televised hearing of the January 6th Committee in July 2022 when the committee showed a video clip of her identifying Stone and Jones, along with organizer Ali Alexander, as the leaders of the “Stop the Steal” rallies.
“Those are the ones that became, like, the center point for everything,” SoRelle said.
Asked about “Friends of Stone” last July, Stone’s attorney told Raw Story: “Mr. Stone was included in the chat group by whoever established it at the time. Mr. Stone did not participate in any discussions in the chat and has no recollection of ever posting anything in the chat.”
But the final report of the January 6th Committee indicates that two days after the 2020 election, Stone sent out a text, reading: “We provide information several times a day. So please monitor the FOS feed so you can act in a timely fashion.”
Grant Smith, Stone’s attorney, said in an email to Raw Story on Monday that his client was not available for comment.
The brief snippet of SoRelle’s testimony included in the televised hearing last July has overshadowed her more detailed explanation to committee investigators about how the “Friends of Stone” chat served as a hub for organizing the election denial rallies leading up to Jan. 6. Immediately after confirming Stone, Jones and Alexander’s central roles in the campaign, SoRelle told investigators about her interactions with 1st Amendment Praetorian, a security group that worked under retired Lt. General Michael Flynn.
“They’re the ones orchestrating the majority of it,” SoRelle testified. Asked to elaborate, SoRelle told the committee: “So, the meetings that the Oath Keepers end up having, they’re the ones coordinating — they’re in the group chats with those particular groups.”
SoRelle confirmed in her testimony that 1st Amendment Praetorian, better known by its initials 1AP, helped delegate responsibility among the militant groups for providing security to influencers during the rallies.
“And from what you remember, 1AP played somewhat of a planning role, along with Mr. Alexander, Mr. Jones, and Mr. Stone, about where to send people for Stop the Steal rallies after the election?” one of the investigators asked.
“Correct,” SoRelle said.
Lewis declined to answer a question from the committee about whether he coordinated with Rhodes or the Oath Keepers, invoking his Fifth Amendment privilege to avoid giving testimony that could potentially incriminate himself during his deposition last April.
SoRelle testified that 1AP’s role became apparent to her when the Oath Keepers went to Atlanta to provide security for a rally that featured Alexander, Jones and prominent white nationalist Nick Fuentes at the Georgia state capitol. SoRelle testified that when they arrived in Atlanta, 1AP leaders Robert Patrick Lewis and Geoffrey Flohr — whom she referenced by his nickname “Yoda” — along with Alexander, summoned Rhodes to a meeting at a hotel.
“And so, he was like, ‘Hey, we need to go over to this hotel, and I’m going to, you know, chat with these guys,’” SoRelle testified. “And he’s telling me it’s Rob Lewis and Yoda and Ali Alexander and that they’re coordinating just basically where all the rallies are going to be and trying to figure out schedules and stuff.”
Describing the scene in a “lobby area” on an upper floor of the hotel, SoRelle said, “It’s just, like, a giant open area. And, anyway, they brought beer and stuff, and we’re all just kind of hanging out and chatting and stuff like that.”
Following the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, SoRelle told the committee that Rhodes conferred with a member of 1AP who joined them for dinner at Olive Garden, although she could not identify the member by name.
SoRelle testified that Tim Enloe, Jones’ security guard, asked Rhodes to provide a security detail to Fuentes, and Rhodes refused. The dustup exposed a tension between what SoRelle described as “the conservative/libertarian” and “fascist/crazy” camps in the Stop the Steal coalition. As SoRelle described it, Rhodes and Fuentes got into an argument at a restaurant area near the Georgia state capitol about white supremacy and why the Oath Keepers refused to work with Fuentes. SoRelle said Rhodes walked off while Fuentes was “talking crap,” and she turned around and gave him the middle finger. Fuentes’ Groyper followers filmed SoRelle and made her gesture into a meme.
The committee report has identified Trump’s tweet in the early-morning hours of Dec. 19, 2020, in which the president tweeted, “Be there, will be wild,” as the singular, galvanizing event leading to the Jan. 6 rally at the Ellipse, which then set the stage for thousands of Trump supporters to overrun the Capitol.
The report emphasized the effect of Trump’s tweet by highlighting a Facebook message sent by Florida Oath Keepers leader Kelly Meggs on Dec. 22.
“Trump said it’s gonna be wild!” wrote Meggs, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy alongside Rhodes last month. “It’s gonna be wild! He wants us to make it WILD that’s what he’s saying. He called us to the Capitol and wants us to make it wild! Sir Yes Sir! Gentlemen we are heading to DC pack your s***!”
Asked about the Dec. 19 tweet, SoRelle argued that it wasn’t only Trump’s call that mobilized the Oath Keepers to begin planning for Jan. 6; the set of relationships that had grown out of the “Friends of Stone” chats provided an infrastructure for delegating responsibility and a division of labor.
“Then it would have been whenever they started coordinating through Ali Alexander,” SoRelle told the committee, in response to a question about when the Oath Keepers started planning for Jan. 6.
“That’s what I’m saying,” she said. “It wasn’t based on President Trump. Everything was done off of the coordination that was being sent out. Like, ‘Here’s our next rally. What’s the next plan? Like, can you do security for this? Here’s the events that we’re planning.’”
