In case you don’t know what a sovereign citizen is, it is someone who thinks that certain laws don’t apply to them based on their own interpretation of the law. They use circular language, legal-babble, and picking and choosing different case precedents to try and get out of paying taxes or getting arrested, with mostly negative results.

I first became aware of the sovereign citizens in about 2019, but didn’t realize it was a whole political/legal movement at the time. I remember seeing a video of a young man and woman getting pulled over by the cops for something relatively minor, like an expired tag. The woman started busting out all the sovcit arguments, that her boyfriend (the one driving) was a “free national” and not a U.S. citizen, and wasn’t bound by motor vehicle laws because he was “traveling” instead of driving. The end result was both of them getting arrested, with plenty of screaming. 

Videos about sovcits being themselves are both entertaining and infuriating. But my big question is, how did they get like that? How do you get exposed to this “I’m above the law” rhetoric? How and where do you find the audacity to tell a judge with decades of experience that he’s not only wrong, but an idiot for not interpreting the law the way you do?

So, the sovereign citizen movement (at least in the US) had anti-government and White supremacist origins. People who oppose the government and its functions are nothing new. But, it took off in the form of “I am above the law” in the 70s. The Posse Comitatus, a far-right group, stated that their way of life as White Christians was being attacked by powerful Jews in the government. To combat these “injustices”, they felt that they should not be forced to follow laws they did not agree to follow. This led members to stop paying their taxes or renewing their car registrations. This group also felt that the only people who should be doling out consequences of breaking laws are county sheriffs and their deputies, since they directly serve the public. But even then, if the sheriff wasn’t doing what “the public” wanted, he apparently deserved to be hung.

The movement and its beliefs began to grow and spread, with many subsets popping up, such as the Moorish Nationals, who feel they are exempt from America’s laws because of Moroccan Moorish lineage, and the Embassy of Heaven, who feel the only authority they should answer to is God. But, what all these groups have in common are these core beliefs: their interpretation of the law is the correct one, they as sovereign citizens have more rights than other citizens, and anything tying them to the government (paying taxes, their birth names, and getting arrested) can be ignored or sidestepped, since they didn’t consent to those things.

How a sovcit gets LIKE THAT is partially due to where they pull their “information.” There are forums, YouTube channels, and “gurus” selling informational courses. These “gurus” would teach their findings to whoever would listen, or whoever was willing to pay. For instance: 

• David Wynn Miller, creator of “Quantum Grammar”, asserted that using his system of extremely convoluted syntax and speaking would get you out of legal trials, since the way a normal person would interpret them would be “wrong.” Quantum Grammar is still used by sovcits of all sorts to this day. (Here’s what the Lord’s Prayer looks like in Quantum Grammar.)
• “Judge” Bruce Doucette told his followers that they themselves held authority and could issue citizen’s arrest warrants to anyone they felt were not following the law (mostly ACTUAL judges). Doucette also told his followers that they had the ability to revoke consent for their own arrests and court proceedings.
• David and Bonnie Straight told their followers to buy their fake legal documents and drivers licenses to avoid arrests, then follow their scripts to avoid being taken to jail. They also convinced their followers to steal their kids away from CPS custody because CPS was going to sex traffic the kids anyway. 

It seems a lot of these “gurus” are preying on people’s desperation and lack of trust in the legal system. People out there get stuck in legal battles that could potentially last years. They become so desperate that they are willing to try anything to get out of the legal hole they are in. So, they pick and choose parts of the Constitution, the Magna Carta, the Bible, and cases tangentially related to their own situations, then twist the interpretations around to suit their needs, regardless of whether it makes sense or not. Then, they convolute their language and pretend to not understand what is being said to them in order to delay until the judge gives up.

Unfortunately for sovcits, these tactics never work.

• David Wynn Miller’s Quantum Grammar has been dismissed as nonsense in every court, and almost always guarantees guilty verdicts.
• Bruce Doucette and several of his followers, when following through on their “citizen’s grand jury,” landed themselves in prison for decades on racketeering and intimidation of public officials.
• David Straight was arrested for traffic, license, and gun permit violations, but died before anything came of it. Bonnie Straight got tried for similar, and also assaulting deputies. She went to prison for a while over it but has a currently pending case for assaulting an officer (as far as the Johnson County booking site shows).

And of course, there are numerous videos of sovcits getting arrested and imprisoned all over the internet, despite their aim of being released with no charges. This is usually about the point that a sovcit realizes “Wow. This way of thinking is bullshit,” then starts complying with the law.

The other part of the “how” is more speculative. I feel it’s simply a Sovcit’s sense of entitlement combined with a lack of personal accountability that makes them like THAT. These are people from all walks of life, united in their selfishness and arrogance. They seem to think that, despite them breaking a law, they shouldn’t have to suffer any consequences because REASONS. They think that if they use legal sounding words and talk semantics, when they inevitably get brought to trial, they will get the case thrown out on technicalities. After all, if someone “overstands” something rather than understands it, it means they didn’t really understand it, and thus, can’t be tried! Right?

The sovcits I’ve seen seem to be looking for that “gotcha” moment like on TV. That pivotal moment where they say that they drop a “truth” in the courtroom or before an arrest, and everyone else goes “Oh shit! We were super wrong! It doesn’t matter that we have verifiable proof that he was driving drunk! We were wrong somehow! Let’s give him a million dollar payout and free handjobs for his trouble!”

But, what actually ends up happening is the cops, lawyers, or judges all get annoyed, and the sovcit gets a harsher sentence than they would have if they had just lawyered up and not been so damn arrogant. 

I personally love when a sovcit is in court and the judge is not having their shit out the gate. There have been multiple judges who were just trying to get the defendant’s name on the record. The defendants started going on with their scripts, saying they were the “beneficiary of the estate of ‘John Doe’” and not actually “John Doe.” The judge responded with, “Okay, so John Doe has missed his court date. I’m revoking bond and issuing a warrant for his arrest.” Then, the sovcit either starts complying or starts screaming and wailing that they’re being abducted or something.

The worst part about the sovereign citizen movement is how people are still so dedicated to it despite all the evidence to suggest otherwise. Many of these sovcit groups operate like cults, with their “guru” accepting money from their followers and preaching their outrageous claims as truth. And like most cults, things don’t turn out well for the followers/subscribers, especially when they try to put those claims into practice. 

I think that at the end of the day, sovereign citizens are just looking for ways to justify and get away with their shitty behavior. No one likes being arrested or going to trial. But when your response to that is to find ways to circumvent punishment with legal mumbo-jumbo, it wastes not only the court’s time, but also your own time and money. The legal process may be time-consuming as-is, but pissing off the judge to the point where you get months on contempt charges can’t possibly make the process faster.