Tag: Trump big lie

The false GOP claim that Pelosi turned down National Guard before Jan. 6 attack

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“There’s questions into the leadership within, the structure of the speaker’s office, where they denied the ability to bring the National Guard here. … We start with a committee chair who will tell you, ‘Everything’s on the table except the speaker’s office.’ How can you ever get to the bottom of the questions? How can you ever get to the solutions to make sure the Capitol is never put in this position again?”

— House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), at a news conference, July 27, 2021

“It is a fact that … in December of 2020, Nancy Pelosi was made aware of potential security threats to the Capitol and she failed to act. It is a fact that the U.S. Capitol Police raised concerns and rather than providing them with the support and resources they needed and they deserved, she prioritized her partisan political optics over their safety.”

— House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), at the news conference, July 27, 2021

Republicans accused House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) of failing to protect the U.S. Capitol from the attack on Jan. 6, claiming she ignored warnings about potential threats and denied a request to bring in reinforcements from the National Guard.

Many fact-checkers have rated these claims false. In March, we gave Four Pinocchios to Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a close ally of former president Donald Trump, for leveling the same accusation at Pelosi without proof.

Five months later, it’s not just Jordan anymore. In a news conference held moments before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack held its first hearing, McCarthy and Stefanik, two top Republican leaders, said Pelosi failed to act on warning signs leading up to the riot. Continue reading.

Jan. 6 select committee to push forward with subpoenas

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Officers testifying ask for answers on which public officials were involved

After hearing hours of gripping testimony from four police officers who endured grave physical and emotional wounds during the Capitol attack, the Jan. 6 select committee members will have time to digest those accounts before the next hearing, which could happen at some point in August.

“It sets the right tone for the work of this committee,” Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said of the four officers’ stories. “But it also says that there is significant work that we have to do over the next few months.”

It’s unclear what the exact focus of the panel will be in the second hearing, but when Thompson asked the officers what they need to see from this inquiry, they relayed that they wanted to know what role elected officials had in it. Continue reading.

Justice Dept: Republican Rep. Mo Brooks may be sued over Jan. 6 speech to Trump supporters

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A Republican congressman’s Jan. 6 speech at a rally ahead of the riot at the U.S. Capitol is not covered by protections for members of Congress and federal employees, the Justice Department said in a court filing Tuesday — drawing a legal line over attempts to stop the certification of the 2020 election results.

Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) had argued that he is effectively immune from a lawsuit filed by his colleague Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) that accused Brooks, then-President Donald Trump, and others of fomenting the failed attack on Congress.

Past court opinions and Justice Department legal interpretations have given broad safeguards to protect elected officials who are sued over their public statements. But in the case of Brooks, the Justice Department decided he went too far. Continue reading.

‘A hit man sent them.’ Police at the Capitol recount the horrors of Jan. 6 as the inquiry begins.

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WASHINGTON — One officer described how rioters attempted to gouge out his eye and called him a traitor as they sought to invade the Capitol.

Another told of being smashed in a doorway and nearly crushed amid a “medieval” battle with a pro-Trump mob as he heard guttural screams of pain from fellow officers.

A third said he was beaten unconscious and stunned repeatedly with a Taser as he pleaded with his assailants, “I have kids.”

A fourth relayed how he was called a racist slur over and over again by intruders wearing “Make America Great Again” garb. Continue reading.

DOJ rejects Mo Brooks defense, says his Jan. 6 speech not part of duties

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The U.S. Department of Justice, in a court filing Tuesday, rejected Mo Brooks’ defense that his fiery speech at the pro-Trump rally hours before the former president’s supporters stormed the Capitol was part of his duties as a congressman.

The DOJ agreed with an opinion from the House Administration Committee that House rules said such actions were not within the scope of his office, as Brooks had argued in a court affidavit last month.

In that affidavit, Brooks asserted the Westfall Act as protection for his actions at the rally – which protects federal employees from legal action when acting within the scope of their office. The DOJ filing concludes with, “The United States respectfully requests that Brooks’ petition for a Westfall Act certification be denied.” Continue reading.

A GOP Event to Support Accused Insurrectionists Went Off the Rails Pretty Quickly

Far-right members of Congress are rallying against alleged mistreatment of Capitol rioters

A small group of Republican lawmakers held a press conference in support of the January 6 arrestees, but it didn’t even last ten minutes. Instead of being met with supporters, the legislators were chased out of their own presser.

Earlier today, other members of Congress teared up while listening to police officers’ gripping eyewitness testimony on the opening day of Congressional hearings about the January 6 insurrection. However, a small group of their far-right legislative colleagues was on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue speaking out about a rather different cause: The alleged mistreatment of the folks who had stormed the Capitol that day.

Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gosar, Louie Gohmert, and Matt Gaetz—all members of the so-called “Sedition Caucus” of legislators, so named because they all voted against the certification of President Joe Biden‘s presidential victory—gathered reporters outside the Justice Department in what they described as an effort to demand answers from Attorney General Merrick B. Garland on the treatment of “January 6th prisoners”. Continue reading.

Five takeaways from a bracing day of Jan. 6 testimony

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The House select committee’s first hearing Tuesday to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection at the United States Capitol was as personal as it was probing. 

Sober verbal accounts from four police officers who came under physical and psychological attack that day were combined with raw video footage of rioters shouting epithets and using physical force against law enforcement.

The panel hearing the testimony was unusually united — especially for present-day Washington. It included seven Democrats and two Republicans all handpicked by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). Continue reading.

Arizona taxpayers could be on the hook for a $9 million bill after GOP subpoenas routers: report

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On Monday night, Bill Gates, a Republican member of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, revealed on CNN that the Republican-controlled Arizona Senate has had Maricopa County officials served with a new subpoena seeking their routers for its audit of the 2020 election.

Appearing on CNN, Gates stated, “Right before I came on here, the board of supervisors received another subpoena from the state Senate ordering us to turn over the routers, in addition to some other information. And they threaten us in these papers that if we do not turn those over by Aug. 2. So that’s next Monday, then we could be held in contempt.”

According to the Washington Post’s Joseph Marks, that could run the bill associated with the audit, seeking evidence that Donald Trump had the 2020 election stolen from him, up to $9 million. Continue reading.

‘Kraken’ lawyers attempt to avoid sanctions by citing Trump’s claim of election fraud: report

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According to a report from Forbes, lawyers who brought lawsuits attacking the 2020 presidential election results in Michigan by alleging voter fraud are attempting to use Donald Trump’s words to avoid sanctions.

On the evening before House select committee opens hearings into the Jan 6th Capitol riot that was inspired by accusations that the election was stolen from Trump, the so-called “Kraken” attorneys, including one-time Trump attorney Sidney Powell, made a new filing.

According to the report, the attorney representing the lawyers, Donald Campbell, asserted that, because Donald Trump also made election fraud claims, the attorneys were within their rights to make the same claims. Continue reading.

New Lincoln Project ad blasts corporate donors who bankrolled ‘murderous violence on Jan. 6’

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As a House select committee begins its investigation into the Capitol insurrection, a new ad from the conservative Lincoln Project targets corporations and CEOs who allegedly “helped financed the very structure that led to the murderous violence on Jan. 6.”

“Who funds the politicians trying to cover up the assault on America’s Capitol?” the ad’s narrator asks, following a clip of former president Donald Trump falsely claiming that insurrectionists were “hugging and kissing the police.” 

The answer, according to the ad, includes “leaders of the most respected and successful companies in America,” such as Koch Industries, Cigna, AT&T, and R.J. Reynolds. Continue reading.