On Friday, Democrat Rep. Bennie G. Thompson of Mississippi announced an agreement for a bipartisan committee to investigate the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building — an agreement reached with Republican Rep. John Katko of New York State. Liberal Washington Post opinion writer Greg Sargentapplauds this “surprising bit of good news” in his column, but he also laments the fact that there are still many disingenuous Republicans who are determined to “obscure” the horrifying events of January 6.
“Predictably, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) immediately said he hadn’t agreed to the deal,” Sargent notes. “What’s still unclear is how many Republicans will support it. The bill will pass in the Democratic-controlled House, but it will also need GOP support in the Senate, since it could theoretically be filibustered.”
Sargent explains why Thomson and Katko’s proposal is a positive development, writing, “Perhaps the most important thing is that it focuses the scope of the commission on ‘the facts and causes’ related to the January 6 attack and to ‘the interference with the peaceful transfer of power.’ It will also look at the ‘influencing factors’ that ‘fomented’ this attack. Importantly, it describes January 6 as a ‘domestic terrorist attack’ waged against ‘American representative democracy.’ That counters the GOP whitewash effort by framing the mission around the need to explore the deep radicalization that led to an effort to overthrow U.S. democracy itself.” Continue reading.