The human rights activist was sentenced to more than seven years in prison in Washington for his role in the January 6 Capitol riot, the harshest sentence handed down in the case to date.

And in March, Guy Rivette, 49, a member of the Three Speakers, was found guilty of obstructing Congress and the police at the conclusion of the first trial of the Capitol storming.

He was at the forefront of the first group to attack the Capitol, prosecutors say, and helped defeat the police with guns, bulletproof vests, hard hats and plastic handcuffs.

After being exposed to the burning gas, he turned back while hundreds of Donald Trump supporters stoked violence and chaos inside the Capitol in an attempt to delay confirmation of Joe Biden’s presidential election victory.

Rivett, from Texas, who works in the oil sector, appeared in the video saying, “I didn’t go in, but I helped start the fire.”

Upon his return to Willy, near Dallas, he threatened his two sons not to report him. “What we do with traitors is kill them,” he said in a conversation that his 19-year-old son Jackson recorded and passed on to the FBI.

During the trial, the prosecution relied on several videos of him in the front row inciting the crowd, describing him as an “instigator”.