Kevin Seefried shown carrying the Confederate flag into the Capitol’s rotunda on January 6, 2021.
Saul Loeb/Getty Images
A Capitol rioter who toted a Confederate flag on January 6, 2021 was sentenced on Thursday.
A federal judge sentenced Kevin Seefried to 36 months in prison.
Seefried was convicted last summer on five charges.
A federal judge sentenced Kevin Seefried, a man who toted a Confederate flag around the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, to 36 months in prison on Thursday, slamming Seefried’s conduct as “appalling” and “outrageous.”
Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee, found Seefried guilty on five charges, including obstruction of an official proceeding, disorderly conduct, illegally parading, and entering restricted Capitol grounds while Congress met to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 win.
“You participated in a national embarrassment,” McFadden told Seefried as he handed down the sentence in federal district court in Washington, DC, adding that his behavior was a “flagrant affront to our system of government.”
Seefried, a 53-year-old of Delaware, was convicted last summer along with his son, Hunter Seefried, 24, who also traveled to Washington, DC for then-President Donald Trump’s “Save America” rally and unlawfully entered the Capitol on January 6. McFadden sentenced the younger Seefried to 24 months in prison in October.
Widely circulated images of Seefried wielding a Confederate flag in the Capitol halls have emerged as some of the most shocking from the January 6 attack. Seefried was among the mob that Capitol Police officer Eugene Goodman diverted from breaking into the Senate chamber, according to prosecutors and witness testimony.
Goodman testified during the June 2022 trial that Seefried refused to comply with orders to “back up” and used “the base of his flag pole in jabbing motion sort of to create space between he and I.”
“He was very angry, screaming, talking loudly,” Goodman said of Seefried. “The complete opposite of pleasant, if you will.”
During Thursday’s sentencing, McFadden said Seefried “threatening” an African American police officer with a Confederate flag was “demeaning,” “especially shocking” and “deeply offensive.”
Seefried’s case was at the “most egregious end” of January 6 cases that McFadden has sentenced, the judge said.
The Justice Department, which has had a string of victories in prosecuting cases related to January 6, had sought a prison sentence of 70 months for Seefried. At least 978 people have been charged in connection to the Capitol riot.
This story is developing. Please check back for updates.