Pseudolaw consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that are claimed to be based on accepted law or legal doctrine but have no actual basis in law and are generally rooted in conspiracy theories. Pseudolegal arguments deviate significantly from most conventional understandings of law and jurisprudence and often originate from non-existent statutes or legal principles the advocate or adherent incorrectly believes exist.
False public notice in Belfast, containing pseudolegal sovereign citizen language and a reference to the strawman theory
Billboard promoting the freeman on the land "legal name fraud" conceit in the United Kingdom
Logo of E-Clause, a sovereign citizen pseudolaw firm
Sovereign citizen movement
The sovereign citizen movement is a loose group of anti-government activists, litigants, tax protesters, financial scammers, and conspiracy theorists based mainly in the United States. Sovereign citizens have their own pseudolegal belief system based on misinterpretations of common law and claim to not be subject to any government statutes unless they consent to them. The movement appeared in the United States in the early 1970s and has since expanded to other countries; the similar freeman on the land movement emerged during the 2000s in Canada before spreading to other Commonwealth countries such as Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. The FBI describes sovereign citizens as "anti-government extremists who believe that even though they physically reside in this country, they are separate or 'sovereign' from the United States".
Cliven and Ammon Bundy, two American activists who became associated with the sovereign citizen movement during the 2010s
The site of the 2021 Waukesha Christmas parade attack, a violent crime linked to the sovereign citizen movement.
A homemade "public notice" with pseudolegal language used by a sovereign citizen in Belfast, Northern Ireland
American activist David Zion Brugger, showing an irregular "identity document" asserting him to be a "citizen of Heaven"