Since its inception in the early 2000s, the ideological outlook of the phenomenon that became known as the Huthi movement,has been shaped by the speeches of its founder Husayn al-Huthi. Until today, as the Huthis effectively control large parts of western Yemen, including the capital, these speeches constitute the discursive backbone of the movement’s rhetoric. While most of al-Huthi’s speeches revolve around his third-worldist interpretation of the impact of Western influence on Yemen and the wider Islamic world, he invested considerable effort into outlining the religious justification for the right of the descendants of Muhammad through his daughter Fatima, the ahl al-bayt, to rule. The right for an Imam from among the ahl al-bayt to rule the umma is one of the core tenets of the Zaydi denomination of Shi'ite Islam to which the movement adheres. Since the al-Huthi family belongs to the ahl al-bayt, this would give them the opportunity to claim the Zaydi Imamate legitimately. While they never actually attempted that, Husayn al-Huthi repeatedly highlights not only the right, but in fact the responsibility of the ahl al-bayt to lead the umma. The paper will explore Husayn al-Huthi’s ideas on the role of the ahl al-bayt in society and by extension his views on the Zaydi Imamate. The statements will be analysed in the light of the loss of status experienced by the ahl al-bayt after the fall of the Yemeni Imamate in 1962, as well as in the context of the movement’s takeover of core state institutions in 2015 and the consequent appointment of ahl al-bayt to key positions. The paper will thus contribute to a better understanding of the attraction the Huthi movement holds for certain parts of the Yemeni population and show how religio-political ideas attain a concrete political relevance by being employed to advance individual as well as collective political ambitions.