The Justice Department accused the nine militia members of coordinating efforts to storm Congress.

Federal prosecutors have charged nine members of the Oath Keepers — an extremist militia that allegedly played a leading role in the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol — with conspiring to delay the certification of the presidential election.

Leveling the most sweeping charges since the insurrection, the Justice Department accused the nine militia members of coordinating efforts to storm Congress and noted that they openly discussed maintaining a cache of “heavy” weaponry just outside of D.C. limits.

Three of those named in the new indictment were arrested last month. Six new defendants were arrested this week.

Private text and audio messages show that multiple members of the group claimed to be acting on then-President Donald Trump’s cues, interpreting his call for a “wild” protest on Jan. 6 as an invitation to come stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory.

“Trump said It’s gonna be wild!!!!!!! It’s gonna be wild!!!!!!!” Kelly Meggs, 52, a leader of Florida’s Oath Keepers, told a Facebook contact in a private message, according to the indictment. “He wants us to make it WILD that’s what he’s saying. He called us all to the Capitol and wants us to make it wild!!! Sir Yes Sir!!! Gentlemen we are heading to DC pack your shit!!”

And when then-Vice President Mike Pence rejected calls to unilaterally block Biden’s win, one of the leaders of the group, Thomas Caldwell, 65, told his collaborators they were “screwed.”

“Pence has punked out,” the Virginia resident texted at 2:06 p.m., adding, “Teargassing peaceful protesters at capital steps. Getting rowdy here.”

Just 18 minutes later, as the Capitol was being ransacked and lawmakers were fleeing for safety, Trump tweeted an attack on Pence that accused him of lacking the “courage” to overturn the election.

The new charges present the most elaborate case yet against members of an organized group participating in the riot.

Members of the alleged conspiracy agreed to “interfere with the official Congressional proceeding to certify the vote of the Electoral College of the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election,” prosecutors said. The defendants also trained and taught each other military tactics, recruited other participants in the attacks and stormed past the Capitol Police barricades at the onset of the insurrection, Justice Department lawyers said.

FBI and DOJ officials indicated last month they anticipate leveling even more significant charges — including seditious conspiracy — against some Capitol rioters. Indeed, back on Jan. 26, the prosecutor overseeing the hundreds of cases, acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Michael Sherwin, said he expected such charges “very soon.”

The new indictment against the Oath Keepers doesn’t include a sedition charge, but the effort to charge nine defendants in a single case still seems to signal a new phase of the investigation.

Prosecutors have also charged numerous members of the Proud Boys, though there have not been linked indictments issued for most members of the group. And other indictments have described individual rioters’ links to militia groups and efforts to join them.

The new indictment offers a blow-by-blow of the nine Oath Keepers’ efforts to coordinate — from the Arlington, Va., hotels they were staying in to the gear they would share, such as communications equipment, goggles and other tactical vests — as well as their communications while they were storming the Capitol.

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