Left: FILE – Proud Boys member Ethan Nordean, left, walks toward the U.S. Capitol in Washington, in support of President Donald Trump on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File). Right: Ethan Nordean in the crowd at the Capitol on Jan. 6 (via FBI court filing).
A leader of the extremist Proud Boys group convicted of seditious conspiracy for the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol says that he should spend, at most, less than two years in prison because his behavior that day was essentially no more serious than a misdemeanor.
Ethan Nordean, 33, was convicted in May of seditious conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress, and conspiracy to obstruct Congress. He, alongside co-defendant and Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio, was deemed by a jury to have planned for violence at the Capitol on Jan. 6, with Tarrio creating a so-called “Ministry of Self Defense” (MOSD) chapter of the Proud Boys and using encrypted messaging to organize and coordinate the group’s role in the attack.
