What could better illustrate that what happened at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 has become a political Rorschach test on which Americans remain deeply divided?
Partisans on the Left accept the official narrative of the Democrats and the corporate press, believing that January 6 amounted to an insurrection and a violent attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
Partisans on the Right believe that however bad the events of that day were, the federal government’s reaction has been even worse, amounting to a weaponization of the Department of Justice to criminalize certain political views.
Many ordinary Americans are left wondering what to believe. With those Americans in mind, it is helpful to sift through what we have learned about January 6 over the past four years—and to note the things that we still don’t know.
In some instances, the Select Committee showed a blatant disregard for facts. It claimed, for example, that Trump was aware of violence at the Capitol for more than three hours—187 minutes, to be exact—before he took action to intervene. Cheney referred to this as a “supreme dereliction of duty.” But in fact, according to a timeline of events compiled by The New York Times (and corroborated by The Washington Post), no more than 25 minutes passed between the reported breach of the Capitol at 2:13 p.m. and Trump’s first tweet addressing the situation at 2:38 p.m., when he wrote, “Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!” About 30 minutes later, Trump again took to Twitter to address the demonstrators: “I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order—respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!”
More important than the report’s factual errors are the serious questions never investigated by the Select Committee. Why did Democrat congressional leaders turn down repeated offers of National Guard troops to protect the Capitol that day? Why was security so lax outside the Capitol despite expectations of a large demonstration? How many FBI informants and other undercover federal law enforcement officials were in the crowd? What communication did the FBI or FBI informants have with protest organizers ahead of the event? Why wasn’t then-Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund told there were federal informants in the crowd? Why did the U.S. Capitol Police open the doors and allow demonstrators into the building? Why did federal law enforcement authorities demand cell phone location data for the thousands of people who were outside the Capitol but broke no laws? Why does the FBI still have no idea who planted the pipe bombs near the headquarters of the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee on the evening of January 5?
The disclosure about the 26 informants invites further questions about what other elements of federal law enforcement were present that day and what exactly they were doing. The video released by McCarthy shows that Ray Epps, a man who is suspected of being an FBI informant and who was at the heart of the events of January 6, lied to Congress about his movements. When the Select Committee had him testify in an attempt to clear his name after footage emerged of him urging the crowd to storm the Capitol, Epps told committee members that he never entered the Capitol. He testified that when he texted his nephew at 2:12 p.m. that day, writing that he had “orchestrated the protests at the Capitol,” he was already back at his hotel room. But surveillance footage shows this is not true. Epps remained at the Capitol for half an hour after he sent that text. Members of the committee knew this but never followed up.
The mystery surrounding Epps is in some ways representative of everything we still don’t know about January 6. And to be clear, the reason we do not know is that efforts to get to the truth have been actively thwarted. Until that changes—until we know all the basic facts about that day—Americans will have no reason to be confident that justice has been served.
Yes, there is still a lot of investigation to do!! What has been exposed to the public has, so far, been aimed at partisan hijinks from both sides. I don’t think we are going to get all of the evidence shown to us, ever. There is too much riding on it for both sides to let some of the BS classified information slip out. I just cannot wait for the next Snowden to expose everything by making a huge info dump onto the internet!