For more than 30 minutes, Chansley spoke to Lamberth about the impact jail has had on him, and the guilt he feels for breaking the law.
He said he was wrong to enter the Capitol on January 6, and that he is not an insurrectionist or domestic terrorist.
His sprawling speech held the attention of the judge, as Chansley quoted Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and "The Shawshank Redemption," and described wanting to live his life like Jesus Christ and Gandhi.
"The hardest part about this is to know that I'm to blame. To have to look in the mirror and know, you really messed up. Royally," Chansley said.
"I was in solitary confinement because of me. Because of my decision. I broke the law ... I should do what Gandhi would do and take responsibility," he says. "There's no ifs, ands or buts about it, that's what men of honor do." He promised to never have to be jailed again.
"I think your remarks are the most remarkable I've heard in 34 years," Lamberth told Chansley, calling his speech "akin to the kind of thing Martin Luther King would have said."
But, Lamberth added, "what you did here was as horrific as you now concede," and he could not justify a shorter sentence.
After the riot and his arrest, Chansley asked then-President Donald Trump for a pardon. He also went on a hunger strike in an attempt to get organic food while in custody and spoke to "60 Minutes" from jail without permission. In September, Chansley pleaded to a felony charge of obstructing Congress' certification of the 2020 vote.