The Senate Rules Committee and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee issued a bipartisan report on the security, planning, and response failures that led to the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection.
The report is damning.
Capitol Police intelligence officers knew on Dec. 21 that Trump supporters were organizing on social media to breach the Capitol on Jan. 6 and “bring guns” and other weapons, the 127-page report says. They were also sharing maps of the Capitol and its tunnel system and discussing how to trap lawmakers inside the tunnels.
This information, for some reason, was not shared with Capitol Police leadership, rank-and-file officers, or other federal law enforcement.
“This bipartisan report is extremely troubling and underscores that Capitol security leaders were woefully underprepared to handle the events that ultimately unfolded on Jan. 6,” said U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, who is the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. “The report reveals that U.S. Capitol Police leadership failed to provide a basic plan for mobilizing Capitol Police officers the day of the Joint Session of Congress, as well as the training and equipment needed to adequately protect the men and women working the front lines against a violent mob. This report also lays out the extent of the confusion, miscommunication, and lack of advance planning that led to delays in the deployment of the U.S. National Guard in support of the overrun U.S. Capitol Police.
“What’s even more alarming is the intelligence failures leading up to the attack on our Capitol – including the inadequate sharing of available threat information between U.S. Capitol Police and federal intelligence agencies,” Warner said. “Following a presidential election in which ratcheted rhetoric fanned the flames of division in this country, it’s unsettling that our intelligence-gathering agencies lacked the ability to recognize the profound threat posed by domestic violent extremist groups.”
The report comes on the heels of the Senate failing to reach a 60-vote threshold needed to establish a bipartisan commission examining the Jan. 6 insurrection styled along the lines of the commission that examined the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.
House and Senate committees are almost certainly going to pursue their own independent investigations into the Jan. 6 insurrection, given how much is still very much unknown about what transpired that day, and the weeks leading up to that day.
“I would have hoped for the report’s recommendations to also acknowledge the unique and serious nature of such threats,” Warner said. “It’s my hope that my colleagues will take this issue seriously or we will not be able to effectively track and grapple with this ongoing national security threat.”
Story by Chris Graham
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