Fast Facts for June 8, 2021
Intelligence and security failures and lack of leadership and planning.
Those are the conclusions from two bipartisan senate committees investigating the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
This 128-page report from the homeland security and rules committees was issued today and –though it points out the heroics of the individual officers on that day — it also points the finger at the FBI, the Capitol Police and exposes some of the online posts of those who actually participated in the attack.
This report, however, does *not* investigate the heightened political environment and rhetoric that may have contributed to the actions of those who showed up at the capitol on that day. The report calls them “rioters” and said their goal was “to disrupt the joint session of congress,” and also says those rioters ended up breaking into the capitol building, vandalizing and stealing property and ransacking offices.”
The report found 21 facts – including the fact that capitol police were not properly trained for a riot of this size and scope, the fact that the chain of command to call in the national guard was convoluted.
The fact that there wasn’t enough coordination and communications between the FBI, Homeland Security and Capitol Police when it came to flagging and taking seriously, alarming online posts suggesting an attack was imminent.
Those posts that were flagged in December and were sharing maps of the Capitol’s underground tunnels said things like “bring guns. It’s now or never.” And “if a million patriots who up bristling with ar’s, just how brave do you think they’ll be when it comes to enforcing their unconstitutional laws? Don’t cuck out. This is do or die. Bring your guns.”
The report then gave 20 recommendations for the National Guard, intelligence agencies, Capitol Police and both the House and Senate Sergeant at Arms.
This is just one of several committee reports about what happened on January 6th that will be released in the coming months.
Read the report here.
PLUS
Three of the biggest pieces of anticipated legislation that are either NOT happening or not happening at this time. Those include:
- A 4th stimulus check (which will likely NEVER happen)
- The $15,000 first time homebuyers credit (which is not happening at this time)
- A bipartisan Infrastructure Stimulus plan (which is not happening at this time)
