What Have We Learned about January 6?

            The topic of discussion for this Freedom Friday is the hope that Congress will soon focus on the problems in America rather than a so-called insurrection at the U.S. Capitol Building. The January 6 committee held its first prime time extravaganza earlier tonight. Fred Lucas at The Daily Signal watched the hearing so that we did not have to waste our time. Then he wrote two articles to tell us what happened.

            In his first article Lucas, outlined six takeaways from the prime-time televised hearing. The select committee that “investigated” the assault on the Capitol Building is composed of “seven Democrats and two anti-Trump Republicans.” Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Vice Chair Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) led the committee.

Thompson and Cheney argued early on that “then-President Donald Trump purposefully encouraged his supporters to attack the Capitol and block certification of Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory during a joint session of Congress.” Thompson accused Trump of overseeing “a sprawling, multistep conspiracy aimed at overturning the election” and that he “spurred a mob” to attack the Capitol with “lies that led to insurrection.” 

            Conservative lawmakers and organizations did not agree with the partisan politics of the program. Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts made the following statement several hours before the hearing started, accusing Democrats of trying to “distract Americans from President Biden’s long list of policy failures.”

Democrats are so brazen they’ve even hired the former president of ABC News to turn the hearings into ‘made-for-TV’ political theater. You can expect a one-sided partisan narrative intent on slandering the left’s political opponents – starting with former President Donald Trump and extending to other conservatives – that has nothing to do with strengthening our republic and everything to do with distracting from their abysmal failures in every major policy area.

What happened on Jan. 6 was wrong, but unlike the violent riots that did so much damage to our country during the summer of 2020, the events of Jan. 6 were subject to one of the largest investigations in our history. If Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi genuinely cares about justice, and law and order, she should immediately direct committee hearings to investigate the violence, damage, and death caused by Black Lives Matter protests leading up to Jan. 6.

            Lucas discussed the following six key takeaways from the two-hour hearing held tonight by the House Select Committee that investigated the January 6^th attack on the Capitol.

1.      Cheney … alleged that evidence would show Trump approved of the infamous chant of “Hang Mike Pence” …

2.      “Thompson focused at one point on a Trump tweet on Dec. 19, 2020, … about the planned rally in Washington. The tweet concluded with these words: ‘Be there, will be wild.’”

3.      The “committee showed excerpts of its video-recorded deposition of former Attorney General William Barr” saying, “I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff, which I told the president was bulls-t.”

4.      “The committee showed short clips of appearances by the former president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, and her husband, Jared Kushner…. The president’s daughter seemed to indicate that she believed the election was not stolen. The video clip was brief.” Kushner was “trying to get as many pardons done [as possible].”

5.      Capitol Police Officer Caroline Edwards “was injured and briefly knocked unconscious outside the Capitol.” She claimed that she saw “a war scene.” She saw “friends with blood all over their faces.” She was “slipping in people’s blood.” She “was catching people as they fell.”

6.      Republicans responded by saying that “Americans care more about issues,” such as the cost of gasoline and the “attempted assassination Wednesday of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.” They also emphasized that Democrats are not opposed to opposing results from the Electoral College when Republican presidents are elected.

I noticed that there was no information about Trump’s offer to have National Guard troops at the Capitol Building. His offer was made on multiple occasions previous to January 6. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi personally turned down the offer.

Lucas’s second article said that a “bipartisan investigation of the Capitol riot would dig into the security breakdown and not ignore questions that didn’t conform to a Democrat Party narrative” (Rep. Jim Banks). His “appointment to the select committee was blocked by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.” Banks told the following to The Daily Signal: 

If I were ranking member of the committee, we would be asking the tough questions that Pelosi doesn’t want the committee to ask, because she’s responsible but she hasn’t been held accountable for the security failures at the Capitol and [on] Jan. 6.

The more we learn, the more we realize that there were serious security failures at the Capitol, and why doesn’t this committee want to dig into that? They don’t want to dig into it because it deviates from their political narrative.

            When the select committee was being formed, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) named five members to it. Pelosi blocked his choice of Banks and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio). McCarthy responded by withdrawing his other appointments. In other words, Pelosi appointed all members of the House on the committee.

            The select committee has not investigated why the Capitol Police were not prepared to deal with a mob even though intelligence prior to the assault said that problems were coming. In Banks’ words, the “breadcrumbs lead to Pelosi’s office.” He added, “The head of the Capitol Police union told us they weren’t prepared for Jan. 6 because the intelligence wasn’t ever disseminated to Capitol Police officers.”

            The incidence on January 6 became another “crisis” for Democrats to exploit. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) is on record as wanting “to use the panel as a reason to push for the end of the Electoral College.” Other Democrats “want to push other changes to election procedures.” They want to advance their agenda rather than discover the truth about why the Capitol Building and police were not defended properly.