Washington (AFP) - Jury selection began Tuesday in the sedition trial of four members of the far-right Oath Keepers militia, including its founder, who joined the 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

Stewart Rhodes -- the eyepatch-wearing former soldier who plotted a military-style assault on the Capitol -- and his followers are charged with taking up arms against the United States to keep Donald Trump in the White House, despite his election defeat.

As the process began to find 12 jurors from over 100 candidates, Judge Amit Mehta rejected an effort by the Oath Keepers' attorneys to move the trial out of Washington on the grounds that local residents are likely to be biased against them because of the January 6, 2021, violence.

Rhodes's attorney, meanwhile, asked the judge to forbid use of terms frequently used to describe the Oath Keepers, such as "anti-government," "organized militia," "extremists," "racist" and "white nationalist" during the trial.

Use of such descriptors "would add nothing but prejudice into what already promises to be an emotionally charged trial," said the attorney, James Lee Bright.

For instance, he said, describing them as "anti-government" could generate negative feelings because many of the people in Washington work for the government.

Guns and combat gear

With a potential 20-year prison sentence, the sedition charge is the toughest yet in the prosecutions of hundreds who took part in the Capitol assault, which aimed to reverse President Joe Biden's victory in the November 2020 election.

Eight Oath Keepers in total have been charged with sedition; the other four will go on trial beginning November 29.

Rhodes, a Yale Law School graduate, and his followers conspired "to oppose by force the lawful transfer of presidential power," according to the indictment.

At Rhodes's direction, "they coordinated travel across the country to enter Washington DC (and) equipped themselves with a variety of weapons," as well as combat and tactical gear, in preparation for the attack, it says.

"We aren't getting through this without civil war," Rhodes told the Oath Keepers in a group chat weeks before the uprising, it adds.

If Biden became president, Rhodes said, "It will be a bloody and desperate fight... That can't be avoided."

Rarely used charge

The Oath Keepers are the first of some 870 charged in the Capitol attack to go on trial for seditious conspiracy.  

The majority have been charged with illegally entering the Capitol, illegally disrupting a session of the legislature -- the confirmation of Biden as president-elect -- and assault on law enforcement officers. 

The sedition charge is very rarely used by US prosecutors. The last time a conviction was obtained on the charge was against Ramzi Yousef, the planner of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

The charge of seditious conspiracy was used in that case in the absence of a domestic terrorism law and was used to highlight Yousef's intent to damage the US government.

In the Capitol assault case, the charge is being used against members of armed militia groups who took part and allegedly coordinated among themselves to lead the attack.

Members of the Proud Boys, another key player on January 6, were also charged with seditious conspiracy in June, but their case has not gone to court yet.

Insurrection Act defense

The trial will focus on allegations that they planned a violent attack on January 6, positioning a stockpile of weapons at a hotel just a few miles (kilometers) from the Capitol, and moved together in a military-style "stack" formation to break through police lines and into the Capitol.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has collected communications between the group members and has photos and videos of their actions that day.

The group's lawyers suggest they will defend themselves by saying they understood that Trump would invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act and deputize the militias to lawfully prevent Biden from being confirmed as president.

That claim has raised expectations that the trial could reveal more about links between the Capitol attack and members of Trump's administration or his personal advisors.