According to a report released on Wednesday by the Anti-defamation League (ADL) Center on Extremism, hundreds of law enforcement officers, politicians, military members and first responders across America are members of the right-wing extremist group known as the Oath Keepers. Among the 38,000 Oath Keepers are nearly one thousand Coloradans, including a disturbing number of law enforcement and other political and emergency response personnel.
Oath Keepers at the Capitol. Image Courtesy of the Insider
The names are on a leaked membership database for the Oath Keepers, whose leader and many members are accused of playing a major role in the January 6 insurrectionist attack on the United States Capitol. The Oath Keepers are an anti-government extremist group associated with the private militia movement.
Those 38,000 names were compiled into a database published by the transparency collective known as the Distributed Denial of Secrets. In turn, the ADL Center on Extremism reviewed the lists and identified at least 370 people that it believes continue to work in law enforcement agencies across the nation.
The list includes police chiefs and sheriffs. There are more than 100 current military personnel on the list. It also identified more than 80 people who were running for or served in public office as of early August, 2022.
As this interactive map shows, the membership of Oath Keepers is not spread equally across the country. Among that 38,000 paid members, the highest numbers in terms of total membership by state appear to be in California, Texas, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Florida, North Carolina, Nevada, Washington state, Ohio, and Colorado.
Just as important, at least a dozen states appear to have 25 or more members of law enforcement and emergency response institutions among their paid membership.
Total Number of Oath Keeper Signups in the State of Colorado as of Aug. 8, 2022: 969
- Elected Officials: 2
- Law Enforcement: 14
- Military: 7
- First Responders: 2
Total Within These Professions: 25
By comparison, these are the numbers of Oath Keepers memberships for a few other states:
Total Number of Oath Keepers Signups in Texas: 3,301
- Elected Officials: 8
- Law Enforcement: 33
- Military: 10
- First Responders: 7
Total Within These Professions: 58
- Elected Officials: 4
- Law Enforcement: 13
- Military: 5
- First Responders: 5
Total Within These Professions: 27
- Elected Officials: 4
- Law Enforcement: 19
- Military: 8
- First Responders: 3
Total Within These Professions: 34
- Elected Officials: 1
- Law Enforcement: 11
- Military: 6
- First Responders: 2
Total Within These Professions: 20
Total Number of Oath Keeper Signups in California: 3,077
- Elected Officials: 4
- Law Enforcement: 24
- Military: 12
- First Responders: 9
Total Within These Professions: 49
Follow this link to the interactive features of this map to see the breakouts: https://www.adl.org/resources/report/oath-keepers-data-leak-unmasking-extremism-public-life
The ADL has not yet released the names of the individuals state-by-state.
Here’s what’s important about these numbers: while there is no evidence that the Oath Keepers pursued any plans to “infiltrate” these institutions, it is also a fact that they succeeded in recruiting numerous individuals within these organizations to join or support the Oath Keepers agenda. This means their extremist ideology has a foothold in mainstream seats of power.
The Oath Keepers is only one of the private army groups such as Proud Boys and the Three Percenters (Ark Valley Voice does not reference them as militias, as that role is filled by state National Guard) that have footholds in law enforcement organizations and in positions of government authority.
Let’s look at the numbers in per capita percentages. If this is all you have to write about maybe you should look into how many are in the Elks or Moose clubs or even better Free Masons. Seem much ado about nothing unless you give them traction
Why in the hell would you believ e anything in a so called leak? They should be classified the same as rhumors.
Well Doug, because the Antidefamation League’s Center on Extremism is known as a credible and trusted source of information regarding threats to our democracy, and to the safety and security of Americans. This was a data analysis of a membership database, which makes it — mathamatical. In my experience, these people have not stepped forward and self-identified themselves.
The difference between a leak and a rumor is considerable. A rumor would be something like me saying that I heard that a certain person is an easy mark who believes anything he hears on OAN. A leak is the unauthorized and unapproved release of information, typically backed up by internal documents that support the allegations in the leaked information.
So, no, they’re not the same, but the fact that people might think that a rumor is the same thing as a leak is interesting, in terms of how it could warp their world view.
Please release the names of all of them.
Robert, thank you for your inquiry. Rest assured, we will release the names, once we can get the information. The information in this article is coming out in segments. Just today we got the breakouts by state.