The horned Capitol rioter known as the ‘QAnon Shaman’ looks completely unrecognizable now.
On January 6, 2021, one image became synonymous with the chaos at the US Capitol: a shirtless, heavily tattooed man wearing a fur headdress with horns, his face painted with the American flag, standing inside the Senate chamber.
Jacob Chansley, who called himself the ‘QAnon Shaman,’ instantly became one of the most recognizable faces of the riot that shocked the nation.
But fast forward, and the rioter looks nothing like the flamboyant figure who stormed the Capitol building.
Chansley’s appearance on that fateful day was impossible to forget.
With his pointed beard, bare torso covered in tattoos, coyote-tailed fur headdress topped with horns, and red, white, and blue face paint, he wielded a six-foot pole with an American flag and a spear on top.
Images of him shouting while standing on the Senate dais – in the very spot Vice President Mike Pence had occupied just an hour earlier – went viral within hours.
His elaborate costume was part of his self-described connection to the QAnon conspiracy theory, which baselessly claimed that Donald Trump was fighting against an elite cabal of Democrats.
The Arizona resident had traveled to Washington, DC, after Trump’s speech, urging supporters to ‘fight like hell’ against the election results.
Chansley was arrested on January 9, 2021, just three days after the riot. He initially faced a six-count indictment for his role in the attack, which prosecutors said included scaling the Senate dais and obstructing an official proceeding.
Mental health examinations while in custody revealed he had been diagnosed with transient schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression, and anxiety.
In February 2021, he issued an apology through his lawyer, expressing regret for ‘arousing fear in the hearts of others,’ per Al Jazeera, and voicing disappointment that Trump had not pardoned him before leaving office.
His defense attorney portrayed him as a vulnerable individual with mental health challenges, arguing that Trump had incited the riot through his actions and words.
Chansley eventually pleaded guilty to obstruction of an official proceeding as part of a deal with prosecutors, and on November 17, 2021, he was sentenced to 41 months in prison.
During his time in custody, Chansley made headlines for insisting on organic food as part of what his lawyer described as his ‘shamanic belief system and way of life,’ per NT News.
Thanks to good behavior, Chansley’s sentence was reduced. Originally scheduled for release in July 2023, he was transferred to a halfway house in his hometown of Phoenix, Arizona, in March 2023.
His sentence officially ended on May 25, 2023, per The Guardian.
In August 2024, Judge Royce Lamberth ruled that Chansley would get back his seized possessions, including his iconic horned headdress and the spear he carried during the riot.
The Justice Department had tried to keep the items as potential evidence, but the judge noted there was ‘voluminous video and photo evidence’ of Chansley’s conduct, making the physical items unnecessary.
The transformation is striking.
In a mugshot released by officials in Alexandria, Virginia, while he was in custody, Chansley appeared virtually unrecognizable.
Gone were the horns, the fur headdress, and the face paint that made him instantly identifiable.
Without his elaborate costume, he looked like an ordinary person – clean-shaven, with no makeup, and stripped of the theatrical elements that defined his public image.
The man who once flexed his muscles on the Senate dais while dressed in furs now faces two years of court-supervised release following his prison sentence.
