In three days, Matthew Leland Klein was set to leave his Baker City home and report to a federal prison in Seattle to serve a 37-day sentence for entering the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, riots.

It was Jan. 20, 2025.

Inauguration Day.

Klein received a document that day.

It was a pardon from the new president, Donald Trump.

Klein, 28, and his younger brother, Jonathanpeter Allen Klein, 25, who also lives in Baker City, were among 1,500 people Trump pardoned for crimes they committed Jan. 6, 2021.

Both brothers pleaded guilty on July 17, 2024, to one felony county of civil disorder.

Matthew Klein also pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor, entering and remaining in a restricted building.

His younger brother pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of assault, resisting or impeding certain officers.

A federal judge sentenced Matthew Klein on Nov. 14, 2024, to 90 days in prison and three years of probation.

Because he had served 53 days in jail after his arrest on March 23, 2021, in Sherwood, south of Portland, Klein’s prison term would have been 37 days. Klein was nearing graduation from George Fox University in Newberg, majoring in computer science, when he was arrested.

A judge sentenced Jonathanpeter Klein on Dec. 2, 2024, to nine months in prison and three years of probation and ordered him to pay $3,000 in restitution.

The Kleins were the first Oregon residents arrested on charges stemming from the Jan. 6 riots. Jonathanpeter Klein was arrested March 23, 2021, in Heppner.

Matthew Klein said in an interview on Jan. 27 in Baker City that although he was prepared to drive to the Seattle prison and begin his sentence, he was optimistic that he would not have to.

He had heard Trump’s statements about potentially pardoning people involved in the Jan. 6 riots.

“I was happy not to go to prison,” Klein said. “But it’s been four years. I pretty much just take things as they come.”

He said that although the felony isn’t officially expunged from his records, they will show that he suffered no sanction as a result.

Moreover, Klein said he is pleased that due to the pardon he will regain privileges that he had lost, such as serving on a jury, voting and owning a gun.

He’s also happy that he is no longer prevented from leaving Oregon.

Jonathanpeter Klein declined to be interviewed about his case and pardon.

The brothers own a crack-sealing and asphalt maintenance business, Klein Bros. LLC, that they started in 2022, while their criminal cases were pending.

Although many news stories about the brothers state that they’re from Pendleton, and Jonathanpeter Klein did live there briefly a few years ago, both have lived in Baker City for about four years.

Their parents, Jeff and Nanci Klein, live near North Powder.

‘Stop the Steal’

Matthew Klein was living in Newberg in December 2020. He was working toward his degree in computer science at George Fox, a private university, when he saw a Facebook post about a rally planned in Washington, D.C.

The event was called “Stop the Steal,” a reference to claims that Trump defeated Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

Klein talked with his younger brother about the event, which was scheduled for Jan. 6, 2021.

The brothers decided to fly to the East Coast to participate.

“That was the whole premise of us being there,” Matthew Klein said. “To raise awareness that people had questions about the validity of the election.”

They left Portland on Jan. 4.

Klein admits he didn’t know about the process of certifying election results in the Capitol, scheduled for Jan. 6.

He said he assumed he and his brother would listen to Trump’s speech that day and then join the protest.

“I didn’t have any intention of breaking the law when I went there,” Klein said.

The brothers listened to Trump speak at The Ellipse, near the White House.

Then they joined a crowd of thousands who walked to the Capitol.

Klein said his intention was to “stand outside and wave my flag.”

He was carrying a flagpole with the Gadsen flag, which shows a coiled rattlesnake above the motto “Don’t Tread on Me.” The flag is commonly seen at conservative rallies and other events.

While standing outside the Capitol, Klein said he saw an open door.

He walked into the building, carrying his flag.

Klein said he had no interaction with any police officers during the few minutes he was inside the Capitol.

“It honestly did not even feel illegal,” he said. “I didn’t feel like I was doing anything wrong.”

Although the situation was hectic and the building crowded with rioters and police, Klein said it appeared to him that several fights involved people who retaliated after police had used pepper spray on someone.

Klein said that after he walked out of the Capitol, he went to a different part of the building and saw a man who was trying to break open a locked door.

Klein said he helped the man break open the door.

He said he acted “in the heat of the moment.”

Klein said police were stationed just inside the entrance. He said he stood and waved his flag but did not reenter the Capitol.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul T. Maloney wrote in a detention memo, unsealed after Klein’s arrest in March 2021, that after Klein helped wrench open the locked door, “law enforcement officers tasked with protecting the Capitol and its inhabitants prepared to fend off yet another wave of attacks from the unruly crowd.”

The actions of Klein and other defendants “created a dangerous scenario that directly interfered with law enforcement’s efforts to secure the building. That they did so as part of a second or third wave of attacks — with knowledge of the mayhem that had already unfolded at the Capitol — shows their reckless disregard for others and the danger posed. …”

Klein said he was never violent. He was not charged with assault or another violent crime.

He said he never had any intention of trying to prevent the election results from being certified — again, he concedes he was “uneducated” about the process.

Moreover, Klein said he finds laughable the notion that he, or anyone else, would seek to overthrow the federal government while wielding a flag rather than a firearm.

“I think most people were there to inform the politicians that there were still people in the country who had questions about the validity of the election,” Klein said.

Aftermath

Klein said he and his brother were at the Capitol for around two hours.

He said they left around dusk, as the crowd was dissipating.

He said he didn’t believe, at that moment, that he had participated in an historic event.

They flew back to Portland a day or two later. Klein resumed his classes at George Fox.

Klein was sleeping in his apartment at Sherwood, about 6 a.m. on March 23, when he was awakened by pounding on his front door and voices yelling “FBI!”

Klein said he wasn’t shocked by his arrest.

In the two and a half months since Jan. 6, Klein said that although he hadn’t scrutinized news about the riots, he was aware that it “was a bigger deal than I had thought at the time.”

Police identified the brothers from a photo of a rally they attended on Jan. 5, 2021, outside the U.S. Supreme Court building.

The Kleins also attended a rally on Sept. 7, 2020, at the Oregon Capitol in Salem, where participants clashed with about 20 Black Lives Matters protesters.

Jonathanpeter Klein was arrested in Heppner. According to court records, while inside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 he allegedy threw a lid from an audiovisual equipment container that hit a Metropolitan Police Department officer on the helmet. According to court documents, the officer momentarily lost consciousness and later reported emotional and mental distress.

After Matthew Klein’s arrest in Sherwood, police brought him to a jail in downtown Portland, where he was confined for about a week. He later was moved to Multnomah County’s Inverness Jail, also in Portland.

With COVID-19 restrictions in place, Klein said he was in his 6-foot by 12-foot cell for 23 hours per day.

His third request for a release was granted, after 53 days.

Klein said he spent much of his time sleeping or “reading crappy novels.”

He said he’s accustomed to being busy most of the time.

“It sucked, but it wasn’t some life transformation,” Klein said.

He said George Fox officials dismissed him from the university, and precluded him from ever re-enrolling.

Klein said he doesn’t know whether he will try to finish his degree at a different school.

He does have outstanding student loans.

He said his decision might depend in part on whether his business continues to thrive.

Klein said he pleaded guilty to one felony and one misdemeanor charge, in July 2024, in part because he wanted to avoid the possibility of a longer prison sentence.

Both he and his brother were initially charged with other offenses, including aiding and abetting in the obstruction of an official proceeding, destruction of government property and disorderly conduct in a restricted building or grounds, according to court records.

Klein said he told the judge who sentenced him that “I don’t plan on breaking the law again.”

The future

Klein said that although he doesn’t regret what he did on Jan. 6, and will not apologize for his actions, given another chance he would not repeat them because he knows the consequences.

Klein said that for him the issue comes down to a single question: Was the 2020 election fraudulent?

He believes it was, and that Trump won.

If that’s true, Klein said, then he thinks his actions on Jan. 6 were justified.

If it’s not true, he believes he was misled by “conservative media” that repeated the claim that the election was “stolen.”

Klein said he has no “animosity” for Democrats or for the “mainstream media,” although he believes both have exaggerated the significance of the Jan. 6 riots, in particular the idea that the people involved were trying to overthrow the federal government.

He said he never considered the possibility of such a thing happening while he was at the Capitol.

Klein said his goal was to raise awareness about questions that he, and others, had about the validity of the election.

He said he’s more upset at conservative media outlets that encouraged that skepticism but then, in his view, distanced themselves from the claim after the Jan. 6 riots.