It was often called F.O.S. — or Mates of Stone — and whereas its members shifted over time, they have been a motley forged of characters.
There have been “Cease the Steal” organizers, right-wing influencers, Florida state legislative aides and a couple of failed candidate loyal to former President Donald J. Trump. One participant ran a web site that promoted disinformation in regards to the Capitol assault. One other was an officer within the Military Reserve allied with Michael T. Flynn, Mr. Trump’s former nationwide safety adviser.
At the very least three members of the group chat are actually going through costs in reference to the riot on the Capitol in January 2021. They embrace Owen Shroyer, the right-hand man of the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones; Enrique Tarrio, the onetime chairman of the Proud Boys; and Stewart Rhodes, the chief of the Oath Keepers militia.
However the focus of the chat was at all times the person whose photograph topped its house web page: Roger J. Stone Jr., a longtime political operative and adviser to Mr. Trump.
Whereas little is understood about what was mentioned on the chat, the membership checklist of Mates of Stone, offered to The New York Occasions by considered one of its individuals, gives a sort of street map to Mr. Stone’s associations, exhibiting their scope and nature within the vital interval after the 2020 election. Throughout that point, Mr. Stone was concerned with a strikingly big range of people that participated in efforts to problem the vote rely and hold Mr. Trump within the White Home.
Among the 47 folks on the checklist are recognized solely by nicknames or initials, and Mr. Stone had pre-existing political ties with lots of them. Nonetheless, as prosecutors deepen their inquiry into the storming of Capitol, the checklist means that Mr. Stone had the means to be in personal contact with key gamers within the occasions of Jan. 6 — political organizers, far-right extremists and influential media figures who subsequently performed down the assault.
Reached by electronic mail, Mr. Stone mentioned that he didn’t management who was admitted to the group chat and famous that Cease the Steal actions have been protected by the First Modification.
“There isn’t any story,” he wrote. “Simply harassment.”
Whereas the origins of the group chat stay considerably obscure, Mates of Stone has existed since no less than 2019, when Mr. Stone was indicted in reference to the Russia investigation by the particular counsel Robert S. Mueller III, mentioned considered one of its individuals, Pete Santilli, a veteran right-wing radio host. In response to Mr. Santilli, the group chat — hosted on the encrypted app Sign — was a sort of secure area the place pro-Stone figures in politics and media, lots of whom have been banned from social media, might get collectively and commerce hyperlinks and tales about their mutual buddy.
“The first cause for the chat was to have a spot for supporters to share stuff,” Mr. Santilli mentioned. “You drop a hyperlink and everybody shares it on their nontraditional channels.”
However after Mr. Trump’s defeat, Mates of Stone appeared to imagine one other objective as Mr. Stone discovered himself in the course of the accelerating Cease the Steal motion devised to problem the outcomes of the election. The Washington Put up, citing footage from a Danish documentary movie crew that was following Mr. Stone, mentioned that in early November 2020, he requested his aides to direct these concerned within the effort to watch the chat for developments.
In latest weeks, the Justice Division has expanded its investigation of the riot from those that bodily attacked the Capitol to those that weren’t on the constructing however could have helped to form or information the violence. Investigators look like excited by discovering any hyperlinks between organizers who deliberate pro-Trump rallies on the Capitol that day and right-wing militants who took half within the assault.
The group chat’s membership checklist contains a number of individuals who match that description.
Named on the checklist are activists like Marsha Lessard and Christina Skaggs, leaders of a bunch known as the Virginia Freedom Keepers who helped to prepare an anti-vaccine rally scheduled for the east facet of the Capitol on Jan. 6. Ms. Lessard and Ms. Skaggs labored with one other anti-vaccine activist, Ty Bollinger, who was additionally on the checklist.
Members of the group have been amongst those that took half in a convention name on Dec. 30, 2020, when a social media professional who previously labored for Mr. Stone urged his listeners to “descend on the Capitol” one week later, promising that Joseph R. Biden Jr. “won’t ever be in that White Home.”
Ms. Lessard, Ms. Skaggs and Mr. Bollinger didn’t return cellphone calls in search of remark.
Ali Alexander, one of the vital outstanding Cease the Steal organizers who deliberate his personal occasion on the Capitol that day, was on the checklist as properly. His lawyer didn’t return a cellphone name in search of remark.
Within the days main as much as Jan. 6, Mr. Stone was scheduled to talk at each Mr. Alexander’s occasion and the rally hosted by Ms. Lessard, Ms. Skaggs and others, together with Bianca Gracia, the chief of a bunch known as Latinos for Trump, in accordance with permits and occasion fliers. Mr. Stone by no means spoke at these occasions, nevertheless, and hurried out of Washington even because the police have been nonetheless securing the Capitol, in accordance with the movie footage cited by The Put up.
Mr. Stone’s connections to Mr. Rhodes and the Oath Keepers have been primarily based, no less than partially, on the truth that the militia group offered safety for him on Jan. 5 and Jan. 6. The Oath Keepers additionally protected Mr. Alexander and his entourage on Jan. 6 and served as safety on the occasions hosted by Ms. Skaggs, Ms. Lessard and Ms. Gracia, courtroom papers say.
At the very least considered one of Mr. Stone’s Oath Keeper bodyguards, Joshua James, has pleaded responsible to seditious conspiracy costs within the Capitol assault and is cooperating with the federal government’s inquiry. Kellye SoRelle, a lawyer for the Oath Keepers, was a part of the Mates of Stone chat as properly and can also be mentioned to be cooperating with prosecutors within the riot investigation.
Mr. Stone, a Florida resident, has lengthy maintained shut ties to the Proud Boys, particularly to Mr. Tarrio, who lived in Miami earlier than his arrest. Members of the Proud Boys have acted as bodyguards for Mr. Stone and have served as a few of his most vocal supporters.
In 2019, after Mr. Stone was indicted by Mr. Mueller on costs together with obstruction and witness tampering, Mr. Tarrio responded by carrying a T-shirt studying “Roger Stone Did Nothing Incorrect” at considered one of Mr. Trump’s political rallies. At one level, Mr. Tarrio’s private cellphone had a message recorded by Mr. Stone.
Nayib Hassan, Mr. Tarrio’s lawyer, declined to touch upon his shopper’s function within the chat.
Throughout his prosecution, Mr. Stone posted a picture on social media of the federal decide in his case, Amy Berman Jackson, with cross hairs subsequent to her head. When questioned in courtroom in regards to the picture, he acknowledged that he had been despatched a collection of images by Mr. Tarrio and two different Florida Proud Boys whose names seem on the Mates of Stone membership checklist: Jacobs Engels and Tyler Ziolkowski.
Mr. Engels was with Mr. Stone in Washington on Jan. 5 and Jan. 6. He initially agreed to speak in regards to the group chat however then didn’t return a cellphone name in search of remark.
One other one that appeared on the Mates of Stone checklist — underneath the title “Ivan” — was Ivan Raiklin, an Military Reserve lieutenant colonel who promoted a plan after the election to stress Vice President Mike Pence to not certify electors from a number of disputed swing states. This plan, which Mr. Raiklin known as the “Pence Card,” was finally taken up by Mr. Trump and a few of his authorized advisers, just like the lawyer John Eastman.
Mr. Raiklin, who didn’t return cellphone calls in search of remark, was on the Capitol on Jan. 6, however confirmed no signal of getting into the constructing. Intently aligned with Mr. Flynn, he has continued to query the outcomes of the 2020 vote, showing at so-called election integrity occasions and arguing that Mr. Trump was arrange by members of the “deep state.”
Whereas the federal government has gathered 1000’s of pages of personal messages in its huge investigation of the Capitol assault, it stays unclear if prosecutors have gotten entry to the Mates of Stone group chat. Together with the membership checklist, The Occasions was given photographs of some snippets of conversations to confirm the chat’s authenticity.
In considered one of them, Ms. Skaggs advised the group that she had simply spoken with the pro-Trump lawyer L. Lin Wooden, who took half within the effort to overturn the election. Ms. Skaggs’s message, which doesn’t bear a date, mentioned Mr. Wooden was claiming that the Riot Act — a type of martial regulation — had been invoked the night time earlier than.
Responding to her message, Mr. Rhodes, who had repeatedly urged Mr. Trump to make use of the Riot Act to remain in energy, answered incredulously.
“I’ll consider it after I see it,” he wrote, dismissing the account with an obscenity.
