The Libertarian Party warmly welcomed an infamous (and apparently remorseless) insurrectionist to its ranks on Monday, writing that the “QAnon Shaman”—who stormed the Capitol shirtless with a set of horns on his head—had the party’s support for his newly announced run for Congress.
Jacob Chansley, 35, became the face of the Jan. 6 riot after scores of photos and videos showed him walking and bellowing inside the Capitol with red, white, and blue face paint on.
Chansley was sentenced to 41 months in federal prison in Nov. 2021 but was released after 27 months and reportedly sent to a halfway house in March to finish his sentence. A request to reverse his guilty plea was shot down by a federal judge in June, who wrote that Chansley was “the face of the riot.”
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After his release, Chansley immediately took to social media to post bizarre messages about the “Deep State,” including a rambling monologue in which he insisted he had “learned numerous lessons” in prison while also saying he had “forgiven my captors.”
Those rants have continued into this week, including some that appear to contradict his own campaign, like his view that a possible White House run by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson would be inappropriate because of his lack of political experience. He still uses photos from the Capitol attack as his profile and cover photo on X, formerly Twitter, where his username is @AmericaShaman.
Nevertheless, Libertarian National Committee chair Angela McArdle insinuated in a statement to The Daily Beast that Chansley had joined the party because the GOP had unfairly “abandoned” rioters.
“It should be no surprise that the infamous ‘Q-Anon Shaman’ is looking to run for Congress as a Libertarian instead of Republican,” she said. “The GOP has clearly abandoned the people who rallied for Trump and bore the consequences.”
Chansley filed paperwork Friday to run in Arizona’s 8th Congressional District—a district that includes wealthy Phoenix suburbs and is currently represented by Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-AZ), who announced last month she won’t seek re-election.
Chansley is allowed to run for Congress as a felon, but it’s unclear if he will be able to vote for himself come Election Day. To have his voting rights restored, he will need to complete every aspect of his sentence for his felony conviction of obstructing an official proceeding, including paying all fines.
Chansley has given some insight into how he intends to run his campaign on social media. In response to someone asking where they could donate, he wrote that he wasn’t accepting donor money because “BIG $$$ is a part of the problem in politics.”
“I intend to run an ENTIRELY different kind of campaign,” he wrote.
The Libertarian Party does not have any members in Congress. The first and only Libertarian to become a federal lawmaker was former Rep. Justin Amash (L-MI), who joined the party in 2020 and left the U.S. House in 2021 after choosing to not seek re-election.
Despite having no presence in Congress, the party claims on its website to have more than 300 party members in public office nationwide—mostly at the municipal level.
McArdle used the attention garnered by Chansley as an opportunity to pitch the Libertarian Party to other Capitol rioters—and other Republicans—who feel they were left behind by Trump and the GOP.
“The Libertarian Party is a home for any, and all, who have experienced aggression, and injustice, at the whim of the State, which is every living American,” she said.
