Thursday, January 07, 2021

'Unacceptable!': Probe Demanded After Footage Shows Capitol Police Standing Aside for Pro-Trump Mob


"The images of police officers calmly allowing barricades open, letting the crowd enter, and taking selfies inside the building with those who have stormed it cannot go without investigation and penalty."


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Police seen around Capitol building where pro-Trump supporters riot and breached the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

Police seen around Capitol building where pro-Trump supporters riot and breached 

the Capitol on January 6, 2021. (Photo: Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Images and videos of U.S. Capitol Police officers taking selfies with members of the pro-Trump mob that invaded the halls of Congress Wednesday fueled growing calls for an investigation into law enforcement's conduct during the assault, with members of Congress and advocacy groups accusing the cops of actively assisting the coup effort.

The Partnership for Civil Justice Fund, a free speech and civil rights organization, called for a "fully public investigation into the federal and local police planning and response to today's events, and termination and prosecution of all officers and officials found to have condoned or colluded with the violent mob that attacked the Capitol today."

"What happened at the nation's Capitol today could only have occurred because law enforcement allowed it to happen. Far-right mobs smashed windows and doors, stormed the Capitol behind a traitorous, terrorist Confederate flag, and broke into the Senate chamber," the group said. "The images of police officers calmly allowing barricades open, letting the crowd enter, and taking selfies inside the building with those who have stormed it cannot go without investigation and penalty."

As mayhem engulfed Washington, D.C. Wednesday, footage circulated showing officers removing barricades that were keeping the crowd of frenzied Trump supporters away from the Capitol Building.

Shortly thereafter, the mob swarmed the building, smashed windows, and entered the halls of Congress as law enforcement did little to prevent the invasion. Footage showed law enforcement officials taking selfies with Trump supporters:

"If the federal police did not want far-right protesters to be inside the Capitol, they would not be inside the Capitol," Peter Gowan, a member of the steering committee of Metro D.C. Democratic Socialists of America, wrote for Jacobin on Wednesday. "Last summer, the police and National Guard attacked peaceful Black Lives Matter demonstrators who dared get too close to federal buildings. Countless people, including me, were injured."

"Authorities offered minimal resistance to the mob sent by the president to prevent the counting of electoral votes," Gowan added. "With few exceptions, the response has simply been to let the far-right mob pass, to wait and see rather than to prevent the violence and seizure of federal property that is occurring."

When asked why they were not forcibly removing those who stormed the Capitol, one officer said, "We've just got to let them do their thing now." According to the Associated Press, four people died as Trump supporters rampaged through the halls of Congress and vandalized the building.

Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.) was among the Democratic lawmakers demanding a probe into the law enforcement response, telling the Washington Post that if those who swarmed the Capitol Building "had been Black, they would have been gunned down before they got inside."

"My feelings about this are bolstered by the footage of law enforcement agents taking selfies with these domestic terrorists who had breached security, and of security removing metal barricades in order to allow the mob to get closer to the capitol," said Jones.

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) echoed Jones' call:

In a statement late Wednesday, the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) noted that "since May of last year, D.C. police have brutally punished protesters for demonstrating against the state, police violence, and white supremacy."

"This is in sharp contrast to the police response to white supremacist violence in Charlottesville, VA in 2017, where right-wing operatives and loyalists rioted in attempt to reverse a city council decision to remove racist monuments," the group said. "Today, police stood down yet again—as is expected of such an inherently white supremacist institution."

"These right-wing operatives are their friends, family, and political brethren," NLG continued. "The difference between the police response to protesters of color just a few months ago and all throughout American history, and the current response to white Trump supporters instigating a coup, lays bare the priorities of U.S. law enforcement."

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Poll Shows Nearly Half of GOP Voters—Lied to by Right-Wing Media—Approve of US Capitol Ransacking

"Among Republican voters, 45% approve of the storming of Capitol, 30% think the perpetrators are 'patriots', 52% think Biden is at least partly to blame for it, and 85% think it would be inappropriate to remove Trump from office after this."


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Published on Thursday, January 07, 2021 
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A worker cleans broken glass from one of the entrances to the U.S. Capitol the day after a pro-Trump mob broke into the building on January 6, 2021. (Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

A worker cleans broken glass from one of the entrances to the U.S. Capitol the day after a pro-Trump mob broke into the building on January 6, 2021. (Photo: Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

A new poll released in the aftermath of Wednesday's violent coup attempt—incited by President Donald Trump and enabled by Republican lawmakers who questioned the legitimacy of President-elect Joe Biden's victory—shows that nearly half of GOP voters approve of the pro-Trump mob's storming of the U.S. Capitol, findings that observers say are inseparable from how right-wing media outlets are lying about the insurrection.

"The right's favored media... offered an alternate reality in which everyone but pro-Trump rioters were to blame for the mayhem at the Capitol."
—Sara Fischer, journalist

YouGov Direct conducted the survey on Wednesday night between 5:17 pm and 5:42 pm. A majority (62%) of the 1,397 registered voters who had heard about the day's events told pollsters that they consider the pro-Trump mob's actions a threat to democracy. But while 93% of Democrats and 55% of Independents perceive what happened as a threat to democracy, only 27% of Republicans see it that way.

In fact, a greater percentage of Republicans (45%) actively support the storming of the Capitol than oppose it (43%). Overall, 71% of registered voters are opposed to the coup attempt, including 96% of Democrats and 67% of Independents.

Among voters who erroneously believe that the presidential election was fraudulent enough to affect the outcome, 56% say the invasion of the halls of Congress was justified.

A majority of registered voters (55%), including 90% of Democrats and 51% of Independents, believe "a great deal of the blame" lies with Trump. Yet, in the eyes of GOP voters, President-elect Joe Biden is the biggest culprit, with 52% assigning some degree of blame to Biden compared to 28% attributing the debacle to Trump.

When it comes to removing Trump from office as a result of what happened at the Capitol—an option that is gaining support among federal lawmakers—50% of registered voters, including 83% of Democrats and 47% of Independents, are in favor. Conversely, 85% of Republicans consider immediate removal inappropriate.

Whereas roughly two-thirds to three-fourths of Democrats deemed the participants "extremists," "domestic terrorists," "criminals," and/or "anti-democratic," 50% of Republicans called them "protestors" and 30% labeled them "patriots."

Republican voters' relatively high degree of support for this week's seditious assault on democracy, progressive critics say, cannot be understood without looking at how right-wing media outlets spewed lies when covering the day's events for their viewers.

Writing in Axios, media analyst Sara Fischer reported that "the right's favored media—conservative TV, websites, and social networks—offered an alternate reality in which everyone but pro-Trump rioters were to blame for the mayhem at the Capitol." Fischer provided a breakdown of "the version of events a good chunk of America got."

"Instead of condemning the pro-Trump mobs that stormed Washington, right-wing media outlets mostly blamed left-wing activists, the media, Vice President Pence—and even police officers—for the riots that some suggested were the start of a 'civil war' in America," Fischer wrote. "Hosts on Fox News, One America News Network, and Newsmaxwent so far as to baselessly suggest that the unlawful protestors at the Capitol may have been members of Antifa."

"Even when it became obvious that the riots were becoming destructive, right-wing networks downplayed the severity of events, calling those marching on the Capitol mostly peaceful protestors," Fischer noted. "Presenters on OANN argued the riots were nothing compared to racial justice protests over the summer."

According to Fischer, "one meme that was posted to TheDonald.win, a fringe-right alternative social network, featured a cartoon of a police officer telling a Black Lives Matter protester, 'Please stop, we can work this out'—while holding a police shield, but holding a gun up against a white MAGA protestor," despite the fact that the overwhelmingly white right-wing insurrectionists were given preferential treatment compared to thebrutal repression of multiracial protests against police violence.

Shedding light on GOP voters' relatively high approval rating of this week's deadly mayhem in the nation's capital—and the complicity of hundreds of Republican lawmakers in fomenting it—Fischer reported that right-wing media outlets suggested that "rioters had no choice but to storm the Capitol in order to fight for investigations into a 'fraudulent' election."

In addition to the destructive role played by misinformation-spreading right-wing media outlets, journalist David Sirota on Thursday also pointed out that "we have long known that the far right—and specifically many Trump supporters—are hostile to democracy."

"Polling data from Monmouth University in 2019 found that about one-third of the strongest supporters of Trump scored in the highest ratings for authoritarian tendencies," Sirota wrote. "In all, Democracy Fund data show that roughly one-third of Americans 'say that an authoritarian alternative to democracy would be favorable.' That's what was on display Wednesday."

Nathan Robinson of Current Affairs on Thursday wrote that even if "the invasion of the Capitol was a farce... it should still terrify us," arguing that the history of the rise of fascism in interwar Germany holds important lessons that need to be heeded.

Alluding to Wednesday's right-wing attack on U.S. democracy, historian Mike Duncan tweeted Thursday that while "the people who raided the capitol last night ought to be punished... they are foot soldiers."

"The real threat to the republic," Duncan added, is far-right political leaders and right-wing media outlets "who have whipped up the storm."

Sociologist Samuel Farber argued in Jacobin earlier this week that the "openly authoritarian, racist, xenophobic," and anti-scientific brand of politics known as Trumpism, which is here to stay until its root causes are addressed, is "a right-wing response to the objective conditions of economic decay and a perceived moral decay."

In order to defeat the reactionary force of Trumpism, Farber wrote, it will be necessary to eliminate the conditions of intensifying inequality that fueled it. This perspective is shared by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who has written that preventing "another right-wing authoritarian" even worse than Trump depends on pursuing and enacting a bold agenda that improves the lives of working-class people. 

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Omar Trump Impeachment Resolution Charges 'Attempted Coup Against Our Country'

"The urgency of this moment is real," said the Minnesota Democrat.


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 Published on Thursday, January 07, 2021 
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President Donald Trump arrives at a rally on January 6, 2021 in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump arrives at a rally on January 6, 2021 in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

Rep. Ilhan Omar released on Thursday articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump, calling the president "the single greatest threat to our democracy."

The privileged resolution (pdf), co-led by fellow Democrats including Reps. David Cicilline (R.I.), Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), Jamaal Bowman (N.Y.), and Veronica Escobar (Texas), comes amid swelling calls for Trump's ouster—using arrest, the 25th Amendment, or impeachment—in the wake of an extremist, pro-Trump mob's Wednesday rampage through the U.S. Capitol in a failed coup attempt. 

"Every day that he remains in the office of the presidency—overseeing the United States military and nuclear arsenal—is a day the safety of the American people and the world are threatened," Omar (D-Minn.) said in a statement.

"The very administration officials who have been complicit in his crimes cannot be relied upon," she continued. "We must impeach and remove him from office immediately so that he cannot threaten our democracy and the world any longer or hold public office ever again. Congress should reconvene immediately to carry out this constitutional duty."

The resolution lists two articles of impeachment, the first of which accuses Trump of violating his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of President of the United States through an unlawful attempt to overturn the results of the November election, which he lost to President-elect Joe Biden. The second article addresses Trump's abuse of "the powers of the presidency to incite violence and orchestrate an attempted coup against our country"—a reference to Wednesday's violence in the Capitol.

The resolution further points to Trump's ginning up of the extremists when he told the crowd before the Capitol was breached: "You'll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong," and his comments to the mob after the attack on the building: "We love you, you're very special."

"Please call the House to order and let's get it done. Today. Right now," Omar tweeted, a message directed at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). "The world is watching and waiting for us to act."

Cicilline (D-R.I.) also announced Thursday the introduction of a separate impeachment resolution. That effort is being co-led by Reps. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and also points to Trump's Wednesday incitement of violence. The resolution states that Trump "will remain a threat to national security, democracy, and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office."

Progressive groups including Patriotic Millionaires have backed the call for Trump's impeachment.

In a Thursday statement, Morris Pearl, chair of the Patriotic Millionaires, assessed Wednesday's violence and chaos by saying that Trump "actively recruited and nurtured this group of traitors, whipped them into a violent frenzy, and directed them to attack the Capitol."

"There must be consequences," said Pearl. "They must be immediate. They must be severe. And they must unequivocally affirm our lawmakers' and this nation's commitment to democracy and the rule of law."

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Ocasio-Cortez Says Cruz and Hawley 'Must Resign'—or Be Expelled From Senate

"No 'turning the page,'" said Public Citizen regarding Republicans who helped incite Wednesday's pro-Trump mob. "No abstract 'healing.' Accountability. Immediately."


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 Published on Thursday, January 07, 2021 
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In this screenshot taken from a congress.gov webcast, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) speaks during a Senate debate session to ratify the 2020 presidential election at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. Congress has reconvened to ratify President-elect Joe Biden's 306-232 Electoral College win over President Donald Trump, hours after a pro-Trump mob broke into the U.S. Capitol and disrupted proceedings. (Photo: congress.gov via Getty Images)

 In this screenshot taken from a congress.gov webcast, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) speaks during a Senate debate session to ratify the 2020 presidential election at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. Congress has reconvened to ratify President-elect Joe Biden's 306-232 Electoral College win over President Donald Trump, hours after a pro-Trump mob broke into the U.S. Capitol and disrupted proceedings. (Photo: congress.gov via Getty Images)

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Thursday vehemently rejected a call by Sen. Ted Cruz for lawmakers and Americans to put the current "anger and division behind us," 24 hours after the senator himself baselessly contested the presidential election results—an action which helped incite a mob of thousands to storm the Capitol building in what has been characterized as an insurrection. 

Cruz and other lawmakers who challenged the results "must resign," the New York Democrat tweeted. "If you do not, the Senate should move for your expulsion."

In addition to President Donald Trump's repeated false claims that the election was "stolen" from him and that the results in several states were illegitimate, the two months preceding Wednesday's attack on the nation's Capitol—where lawmakers were convening to certify President-elect Joe Biden's victory—were characterized by the refusal of other Republicans in both the House and Senate to accept the results. 

Cruz joined with seven other senators including Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Rick Scott of Florida to vote to overturn the election results on Wednesday night, hours after the insurrection was brought to an end. One hundred and thirty nine Republican House members also voted against certifying the election results despite dozens of federal and state court rulings which have rejected Trump's and other GOP members' challenges.

Amid the challenge, Ocasio-Cortez noted, Trump supporters who believe that Biden's victory is fraudulent—as more than three-quarters of Republican voters now do, according to a recent poll—descended on the Capitol building, forcing lawmakers and journalists to go into hiding while barricades were breached, windows broken, and offices vandalized in an assault that led to the death of four people.

"Sen. Cruz, you must accept responsibility for how your craven, self-serving actions contributed to the deaths of four people yesterday," Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.

Government watchdog Public Citizen echoed Ocasio-Cortez's rejection of Cruz's statement, in which he defended his decision to repeatedly challenge the "integrity" of the election—found by the Trump-created Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to be "the most secure in American history"—while also claiming to want a "peaceful and orderly transition of power."

"No turning the page," tweeted the organization, calling for immediate "accountability" for those who stoked the flames that led to Wednesday's violence. 

In addition to calling for the resignations of Cruz and Hawley, who was the first senator to announce he would challenge the election results, Ocasio-Cortez on Wednesday joined Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) in calling for the expulsion of other lawmakers who objected to certifying the election. On Thursday, Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) joined the call. 

"The Republican members of Congress who incited the attempted coup our Capitol should be expelled from Congress," tweeted Bowman. 

The congressman urged supporters to sign a petition supporting the resolution, which has garnered more than 141,000 signatures so far. 

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'White Privilege on Steroids': Ire After Pro-Trump Mob Gets Red Carpet Compared to Black Lives Matter

Had the Capitol insurrectionists "been Black and Brown," they "wouldn't have made it up those steps," asserted Rep. Cori Bush. 


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Police brutally cleared Black Lives Matter protesters from near the White House in Washington, D.C. on June 1, 2020. (Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AFP via Getty Images)

A Black Lives Matter protester is assaulted by a police officer during a June 1, 2020 Washington, D.C. protest against the police killing of unarmed Black man George Floyd in Minneapolis. (Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AFP via Getty Images)

For many Black Americans, Wednesday's deadly mob insurrection in Washington, D.C. and the manner in which it was managed by police was yet the latest affirmation of the double standards inherent in a nation built upon a foundation of slavery—in the case of the U.S. Capitol literally so—and enduring racial oppression.

"We must acknowledge the profound inequity of a broken system that allows peaceful protesters to get tear-gassed for a photo op, while domestic terrorists who storm the Capitol in a violent coup attempt get to roam the streets freely."
—Rep. Barbara Lee 

Incited by calls from President Donald Trump and his leading accolytes to "take back our country" in a "trial by combat," hundreds of die-hard loyalists—almost all of them white—violently attacked the beating heart of American democracy while lawmakers attempted to perform their crucial duty. 

Some of the police officers stood aside and even opened the gates so the insurrectionists, some reportedly armed with guns and bombs, could rush in. Others scaled walls and surged past overwhelmed officers to join the marauding MAGA mob inside. Many of the attackers appeared unopposed as they ransacked and looted the place while lawmakers and staff fled for their lives. 

When police finally regained control of the building, some of them laughed and posed for selfies with the seditious invaders. Another officer held hands with a trespasser to help her down the Capitol steps. 

The contrast between Wednesday's attempted coup against the United States government and police treatment of Black Lives Matter protests in Washington, D.C. and around the country in recent years is, as numerous observers have noted, "black and white." 

"It's definitely a difference," Lecia Brooks, chief of staff at the Southern Poverty Law Center, told The Globe and Mail. "It is a starkly different picture when the protesters are white. This is white privilege. These Trump supporters can walk boldly in to take over the... Capitol." 

When racial justice advocates peacefully protested in Washington last summer for Black lives cut short by police and white supremacist violence, the response from law enforcement was swift and brutal.

Although the protesters were a block away from the White House and did not attempt to breach its grounds, thousands of heavily armed federal and local law enforcement officers, backed by military air support and surveillance, were deployed to brutally disperse them so that Trump could make his way to a nearby church to pose for a photo with a Bible. 

It was a scene repeated around the nation during Black Lives Matter protests in recent years. Indigenous, anti-war, and other protesters have experienced similarly horrific violence. But Blacks have borne the brunt of such brutality ever since they started standing up for their lives, their dignity, and their equality. 

"White privilege is on display like never before in the U.S. Capitol," noted author and scholar Ibram X. Kendi. "If these people were Black... well, we all know what would be happening right now to them."

In an interview with MSNBC on Wednesday, newly sworn-in Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) agreed, saying that "had it been people who look like me, had it been the same amount of people, but had they been Black and Brown, we wouldn't have made it up those steps. We wouldn't have made it to be able to get into the door and bust windows and go put our feet up on the desks of Congress members."

"It was white privilege, and it was the call of our president and it was encouraged by our Republican colleagues," said Bush, who on Wednesday said she would introduce a resolution calling for the expulsion of GOP lawmakers whom she accused of inciting the violence.

Condemning Wednesday's attack as "domestic terrorism at its worst," human rights advocate Martin Luther King III—whose father was assassinated for championing Black lives and opposing what he called the "evil triplets" of racism, militarism, and materialism—told 9 News Australia that the police reaction to the Trumpist "treason" was "white privilege on steroids." 

"If you look at how Black Lives Matter demonstrations—peaceful demonstrations—have been handled, and how these individuals were able to get into the Capitol... and offices of Congress members, this is perplexing," said King. "And it's all because the president called for it. Under a different set of circumstances, he would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law." 

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