Pro-Trump protesters inside the US Capitol building
Pro-Trump protesters inside the US Capitol buildingReuters/Michael Nigro/Sipa USA

A Navy reservist charged for participating in the storming of the US Capitol on Jan. 6, who prosecutors say is a Nazi sympathizer with a high level government security clearance, was given a three year federal prison sentence on Thursday.

Hatchet Speed, 41, who on conversations recorded by the FBI spoke about his admiration for Adolf Hitler, was sentenced for firearms offences in a US District courtroom in Alexandria, Virginia, the Associated Press reported.

Speed is a veteran who had top-secret security clearances while employed by a defense contractor.

He also faces sentencing for charges in Washington DC for obstructing an official proceeding stemming from his participation on Jan. 6 in the protest that attempted to disrupt the Congressional session certifying the Electoral College vote. He was found guilty in that case in March.

The sentencing for those charges is taking place in May. Speed faces five to six years in prison.

In 2022, an undercover FBI agent recorded a conversation with Speed in which he spoke of his admiration for Hitler, Olympic Park bomber Eric Rudolph and Unabomber Ted Kaczynski.

In the recordings, Speed also made antisemitic statements and encouraged violently targeted Jews, including stating he wanted to "wipe out” the American Jewish community.

Prosecutors also noted that he collected neo-Nazi memorabilia.

In the conversations, Speed made anti-government remarks laced with antisemitism, which prosecutors in the DC trial told the judge explained why he joined the march on the Capitol.

Besides stating that he believed the 2020 election had been stolen by Joe Biden, the prosecution said that he also spoke of his admiration for Hitler and claimed that Biden was controlled by Jews.

“Speed saw the Jews as `everywhere,' fighting to destroy Christians, and he was not willing to sit by,” the prosecution wrote in a court document.

The conversations also included Speed speaking about a plan “to enlist Christians to wipe out the country's entire Jewish population.”

“To defeat the Jewish threat and topple the government, Speed told the [agent] that a violent response was necessary – and that the Jews stood in the way,” prosecutors said.

(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)