Commission to investigate January 6 Capitol riot

[Rewind]

Donald Trump spent many months making false accusations of voter fraud and a "stolen" election. On January 6, he told his blindly loyal supporters that he won the election "in a landslide." He told them they need to "stop the steal." He told them to march down Pennsylvania Avenue to the United States Capitol. He told them, "If you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore." The ensuing riot left five people dead. Trump was impeached on a charge of inciting an insurrection – and acquitted. The vote in the Senate was 57 to 43. A conviction would have required at least 67 votes. Forty-three Retrumplicans refused to hold Trump accountable.

Senate minority leader McConnell – one of the Retrumplicans who refused to hold Trump accountable – said Trump "behaved disgracefully," committed a "dereliction of duty" and was "morally responsible" for the riot. McConnell added, "Trump is still liable for everything he did while in office. He didn't get away with anything. Yet. Yet. We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. Former Presidents are not immune from being held accountable by either one."

And that brings us to today's announcement by Nancy Pelosi. Trump could still face criminal charges for inciting an insurrection.

Pelosi announces plans for '9/11-type commission' to investigate Capitol attack
CNN, Feb 15 2021 4:32 PM ET

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today announced in a letter to House Democrats plans for the creation of a "9/11-type commission" to investigate the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. "To protect our security, our next step will be to establish an outside, independent 9/11-type commission to investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the January 6, 2021 domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex," Pelosi wrote.

A commission of this nature would be established by a statute, passed by both chambers and signed into law by the President. The commission members would not be elected leaders and would be outside the government. The deadly attack prompted House Democrats to move swiftly to impeach former President Donald Trump in January. The Senate impeachment trial of the former President concluded over the weekend and ended in Trump's acquittal on a single charge of incitement of insurrection.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/15/polit...ion/index.html

[Listener]

It is also possible that people who were injured in the riot and the families of people who died in the riot could file lawsuits against Trump.

[Rewind]

"Gentlemen, start your lawsuits!"

Democratic Congressman sues Trump over role in Capitol riot
The Associated Press, Feb 16 2021 8:27 AM

A Democratic Congressman today accused Donald Trump in a federal lawsuit of inciting the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol and of conspiring with his lawyer and extremist groups to try to prevent the Senate from certifying the results of the Presidential election he lost to Joe Biden. The lawsuit from Mississippi's Representative Bennie Thompson, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, is part of an expected wave of litigation over the January 6 riot and is the first filed by a member of Congress. It seeks unspecified punitive and compensatory damages. The case also names as defendants the Republican former President's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani and groups including the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, extremist organizations whose members have been charged by the Justice Department with taking part in the siege.

https://www.aol.com/news/democratic-...152740440.html

[Rewind]

Trump called McConnell "a dour, sullen and unsmiling political hack" who "will never do what needs to be done or what is right for our country." Wow. And McConnell voted to acquit him!

Trump rips McConnell in lengthy statement after being acquitted in impeachment trial

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/16/polit...ell/index.html

[Rewind]

How shameful! And one of the officers was wearing one of Trump's goofy red "Make America Great Again" caps.

6 Capitol police officers suspended, another 29 investigated for alleged roles In January 6 riot
The acting police chief vows “appropriate discipline” for behavior not in keeping with the department’s rules of conduct.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/6-cap...b67c32961c8271

[Rewind]

The January 6 insurrection at the Capitol was not spontaneous. It was carefully planned and carefully coordinated by members of various right-wing extremist groups. Those are the rioters to whom Trump said on the day of the attack, "We love you."

9 alleged Oath Keepers charged in conspiracy to attack Capitol

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/19/polit...tol/index.html

[Rewind]

The Marine Corps motto is "Semper fidelis" ("Always faithful"). The ten Marine Corps veterans who have been arrested for taking part in the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol somehow got the misguided idea that they need to be faithful to Donald Trump and him only.

At least 235 charged and 400 investigations: What we know about the "unprecedented" Capitol riot arrests

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/capitol...ts-2021-02-20/

[Rewind]

At today's Senate hearing, several officers testified they were prepared for a protest but not for a riot. Considering Trump spent many months making unfounded allegations of voter fraud and a stolen election and then told his blindly loyal supporters to march to the Capitol and "fight like hell," officers should have known there would be a riot.

Former Capitol Police Chief says rioters 'came prepared for war'
White supremacists were involved in Capitol attack, officials testify in the first public hearing on the January 6 riot.

https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-ne...0cbfcf2c4d28cb

[Rewind]

The Republican party no longer exists – except in name. It has become The Cult Of Donald Trump and is dominated by wealthy white men (such as Trump), white nationalists (such as Trump), QAnon supporters (such as Trump) and conspiracy theorists (such as Trump). Loyalty to the Constitution, our democracy and the rule of law has been replaced with loyalty to Donald Trump and him alone. What used to be the party of Theodore Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush is now the party of Ted Cruz, Matt Gaetz, Mo Brooks, Marco Rubio, Paul Gosar, Roger Stone, Josh Hawley, Lindsey Graham, Marjorie Taylor Greene.......and Ron Johnson.

Ron Johnson drops a ridiculous conspiracy theory at the Senate Capitol attack hearing
Chris Cillizza, CNN, Feb 23 2021 3:46 PM ET

Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson is willing to push wild conspiracy theories about what happened before, during and after the January 6 riot at the US Capitol. He suggested that Speaker Nancy Pelosi impeached former President Donald Trump over his role in the riot as a way to cover up her own malfeasance on that day – although he's never actually explained what Pelosi did wrong. And Johnson said last week that he didn't believe that what happened at the Capitol was an "armed insurrection," despite ample evidence that it was.

Today, Johnson used his time in the first public Senate hearing on the Capitol attack to spread a single eyewitness account suggesting that there were professional provocateurs seeded in the crowd on January 6 that led the largely peaceful gathering to turn violent. Johnson read excerpts from a piece by J. Michael Waller, which ran in The Federalist on January 14. In it, Waller claimed that "a small number of cadre appeared to use the cover of a huge rally to stage its attack," suggesting that these "agents-provocateurs" were a) not Trump supporters and b) were primarily responsible for the violent storming of the Capitol. Waller also argued that the Capitol Police badly overreacted to the crowd, which turned things violent.

None of Waller's account jibes with what we know about what happened on January 6. The FBI has said there is zero evidence that Antifa or any other group of leftist provocateurs had been part of the January 6 crowd, much less been the ones inciting violence. And the vast majority of people arrested identify with far-right groups like the Oathkeepers, not any groups on the extreme left.

While Johnson is more than willing to take one man's word for it that those gathered for the "Stop the Steal" rally were peaceful until made violent by these alleged "agents provocateurs," he was far less willing to come to the same conclusion during the protests in Portland last summer. "When you do little or nothing to stop riots, you unleash anarchy," Johnson said at the time. "When you encourage criminals and unleash anarchy, people die. All of us suffer." Ahem.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/23/polit...ack/index.html

[Rewind]

Repeat a lie often enough and people will believe it. Donald Trump spent months making baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud and insisting he won the 2020 Presidential election "in a landslide." In a recent poll, 58% of Retrumplicans believe Trump won the election and it was "stolen" from him. At Trump's urging, hundreds of his blindly loyal supporters staged a deadly insurrection at the Capitol on January 6. They haven't given up. They're plotting more attacks. Their devotion and loyalty to Donald Trump knows no bounds. If he asked them to drink cyanide-laced grape Flavor Aid, they would gladly do so.

Trump supporters want to 'blow up' Capitol, police chief warns
Reuters, Feb 25 2021 1:32 AM

Donald Trump supporters who launched a deadly assault on the US Capitol last month have indicated they want to “blow up” the building and kill members of Congress, the acting chief of the Capitol Police said today. Threats suggest extremists could target the building during an address by President Joe Biden, Acting Chief Yogananda Pittman told lawmakers as she advocated for continued high security around the building.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-u...-idUSKBN2AP10N