The Saga of Congress’s Jan. 6 Investigation

[0] From New York Times, I'm Michael Bavarro.

[1] This is a daily.

[2] On Tuesday, a special congressional committee began investigating the January 6th attack on the United States Capitol.

[3] Today, my colleague, Luke Broadwater, on why it's not the kind of investigation that anybody had originally wanted.

[4] It's Wednesday, July 28th.

[5] Luke, you were at this hearing on Tuesday morning on Capitol Hill.

[6] Can you describe the scene?

[7] Yes, the hearing got underway around 9 .30 a .m. The Select Committee to investigate the January 6th attack on the United States Capitol will be in order.

[8] I would say it immediately became both a somber and emotional affair.

[9] Four police officers who had defended.

[10] the Capitol against a vicious attack, entered the room wearing their dark blue uniforms.

[11] And they sat down one by one.

[12] They were greeted by the lawmakers of the committee.

[13] And one of the first things that happened in the committee room was members of the committee played a very graphic video of the violence that the officers endured that day.

[14] We got to hear what we have.

[15] The city has played.

[16] Out two, 1033, who's from the Capitol?

[17] They've got the gallows sit upside this Capitol building.

[18] It's time to start fucking using them.

[19] I saw one of the officers tear up during it.

[20] Another reached over to a fellow cop he had served with that day and put his arm around him.

[21] And they began to tell their stories.

[22] They're very personal stories about what they endured that day.

[23] A chaotic melee ensued.

[24] Terrorists pushed through the line and engaged us in hand -to -hand combat.

[25] One officer described how rioters attempted to gouge his eye out.

[26] Several attempted to knock me over and steal my baton.

[27] One latched onto my face and got his thumb in my right eye, attempting to gouge it out.

[28] I cried out in pain and managed to shake him off.

[29] And they called him a traitor as they sought to invade the Capitol.

[30] Another woman, who was part of the mob of terrorists laying siege to the Capitol of the United States, shouted traitors.

[31] Another...

[32] What we were suggested that they was like something from a medieval battle.

[33] He said the day was akin to a medieval battle.

[34] As I was swarmed by a violent mob, they began to beat me with their fists and with what felt like hard metal objects.

[35] A third described being beaten unconscious and struck repeatedly with a taser.

[36] I heard chanting from summon the crowd, get his gun and kill him with his own gun.

[37] I was electrocuted again.

[38] and again and again with a taser.

[39] And he pleaded with his assailants telling them, I have kids.

[40] During the assault, I thought about using my firearm on my attackers.

[41] But I knew that if I did, I would be quickly overwhelmed.

[42] So I had instead decided to appeal to any humanity they might have.

[43] I said as loud as I could manage, I've got kids.

[44] And a fourth officer relayed how he was called racist slum.

[45] over and over again.

[46] Then the crowd, perhaps around 20 people, joined in screaming, boo, fucking nigger.

[47] No one had ever, ever called me a nigger while wearing the uniform of a Capitol police officer.

[48] To the point where he broke down and cried in the storied rotunda of the Capitol after the horrors of that day were over.

[49] I sat down on the bench in the rotunda with a friend of mine, who was also a black capital police officer and told him about the racial slurs I endured.

[50] I became very emotional and began yelling how the blank could something like this happen.

[51] Is this America?

[52] I began sobbing.

[53] Officers came over to console me. So these were four officers who had really compelling personal stories of confronting the mob.

[54] And as the hearing went on, She recognizes a gentleman from Illinois.

[55] The lawmakers themselves on the committee also were reacting emotionally.

[56] I never expected a day to be quite as emotional for me as it has been.

[57] I saw Adam Kinsinger, a Republican on the committee, breakdown in tears as he thanked the officers for their heroism.

[58] You guys may, like, individually feel a little broken.

[59] You know, you talk about the impact of that day.

[60] But you guys won.

[61] And we thank you for holding that line.

[62] And I saw Stephanie Murphy, a Democrat from Florida, also become emotional as she listened to the officer's testimony.

[63] You know, I have two young children.

[64] I have a 10 -year -old son and a 7 -year -old daughter.

[65] And they're the light of my life.

[66] And the reason I was able to hug them again was because of the courage that you you and your fellow officers showed that day.

[67] And so just a really heartfelt thank you.

[68] And if you didn't know any better, you would just have watched this committee and thought this was a traditional bipartisan committee trying to get to the facts about what happened during a tragic attack on the nation's capital.

[69] But as this very somber fact -finding description of the...

[70] The violence of January 6th is going on inside this hearing room.

[71] Outside is a completely different reality.

[72] This committee is completely partisan from top to bottom.

[73] There is a reason that Nancy Pelosi is the most disliked elected official in America.

[74] She doesn't want the American people to know the truth or learn the facts.

[75] Speaker Pelosi wants her narrative and her outcome to prevail and not the truth.

[76] She doesn't want a fair.

[77] or bipartisan investigation.

[78] She wants a political one.

[79] That becomes a failed committee and a failed report, a sham that no one can believe.

[80] The Republican leadership of the House of Representatives was just an hour before the hearing began, condemning the panel that was hearing it as a partisan exercise and a sham.

[81] So, Luke, how did we get to this point where a congressional committee devoted to trying to understand what happened on January 6 and who is responsible for it devolved into this bizarre split -screen universe.

[82] Well, shortly after the attack, there was widespread agreement that it should be investigated.

[83] Kevin McCarthy, the leader of the Republicans in the House, said that President Trump bore responsibility for the violence.

[84] The president bears responsibility for Wednesday's attack.

[85] on Congress by mob rioters.

[86] And that there should be a fact -finding commission to investigate it.

[87] January 6th was a disgrace.

[88] Leader McConnell, the leader of the Senate Republicans, said that President Trump was not off the hook.

[89] President Trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office.

[90] Didn't get away with anything yet.

[91] And one by one, you heard Republicans talking along these lines.

[92] Lindsay Graham said he never wanted to talk with Trump again or deal with them.

[93] there was sort of this widespread belief that they were going to act in a different way than they had in the past, and this was going to change things.

[94] And they were really going to investigate how Trump radicalized a portion of the base to make them want to storm the capital and overturn the election.

[95] Right.

[96] And I think the question back then was how would this bipartisan consensus and this outrage over January 6th, how would it be channeled into some kind of investigative?

[97] process that matched the scale of what had happened.

[98] That's correct.

[99] The first thing Democrats wanted to do was impeach the president.

[100] You'll remember back in January about a week after the attack on the Capitol that Democrats quickly pursued a second impeachment of former President Trump to hold him accountable under the charge of inciting an insurrection.

[101] But the feeling at the time among most Republicans was that impeaching the president a second time was not a step that they wanted to take.

[102] But they did want to get to the bottom of January 6th.

[103] There was still a lot of raw feelings about it.

[104] There was a sense that the Democratic process had been completely disrupted in a way that was unacceptable.

[105] And the proposal that they had was to have a 9 -11 -style commission.

[106] And what does that mean, a 9 -11 -style commission?

[107] Well, the 9 -11 commission was the gold standard of how to carry out a bipartisan or even non -partisan investigation.

[108] It was an independent commission where Democrats and Republicans got to appoint an even number of people to the panel.

[109] And they were not current lawmakers who were trying to win re -election or needed to be popular with the voters.

[110] they were, for the most part, some heavy hitters who had been former senators or governors or people involved in the Watergate investigation, who would now come either out of retirement or step aside to devote themselves to this sort of neutral and patriotic cause.

[111] I remember one of the first meetings they had, the members of the committee, were sitting as Republicans on one side, Democrats on the other, and they were, told not to do that.

[112] They were supposed to sit next to each other.

[113] They were supposed to not treat each other by political party, and it was supposed to be completely bipartisan or even nonpartisan.

[114] They spent the better part of two years investigating what went wrong.

[115] They had testimony from everybody up to the president himself and the vice president.

[116] And at the end of their investigation, they put together a really authoritative report that actually became a best -selling book.

[117] I remember reading it not long after I graduated from college.

[118] And for the first time, I think I really understood what it motivated al -Qaeda and the security breakdowns that had happened and how that really hampered the United States and keeping the people safe.

[119] And so those were things that I think a lot of the public learned from that report.

[120] And I would say the most important thing was to establish a shared set of facts.

[121] That the entire country, whether you were a Republican or Democrat, here was a report that everyone could agree upon.

[122] It was not one side or the other telling you what happened.

[123] It was the definitive document about how 9 -11 happened, who was to blame, and how we can fix things.

[124] So that is the model that both sides are saying they're ready to embrace when it comes to investigating January 6th.

[125] So what happens to that proposal?

[126] Well, in May, Republicans have a decision to make, whether they're going to go ahead and continue with what they've said they want, which is a bipartisan investigation into the January 6th attack, or are they going to listen to former President Trump, who's been telling everybody that will listen, that nothing major happened that day, that the police officers were actually embraced by, you know, a beautiful crowd of peaceful supporters.

[127] And come May, both Kevin McCarthy, who is the leader of the House Republicans, and Senator Mitch McConnell, who leads the Senate Republicans, decide they're going to oppose the commission.

[128] And what's your understanding of why?

[129] Well, it's a completely political calculation.

[130] If you talk to Republicans, they believe that 2022 is their year to win back the House.

[131] And if you talk to them privately, they'll tell you that they know January 6th is a losing issue for them in their view.

[132] They know it was President Trump supporters who attacked the Capitol.

[133] And they think every day spent talking about January 6th is a reminder of the extremism of some of the Republican Party.

[134] it's lockstep loyalty to Donald Trump, how that led to a very dark day in American history, an embarrassment for their party and for the country, and they don't want to talk about it anymore.

[135] Right.

[136] So the House, which has the votes to do this just with the Democrats, votes to pass a September 11th -style commission.

[137] But by the time it gets to the Senate, it needs 10 Republicans to support it because of the Senate's filibuster rule.

[138] And after careful consideration, I've made the decision to oppose the House Democrats' slanted and unbalanced proposal for another commission to study the events of January the 6th.

[139] Senator Mitch McConnell decides to use his first filibuster of Joe Biden's presidency against the January 6th commission.

[140] And I'll continue to urge my colleagues to oppose this extraneous layer when the time comes.

[141] for the Senate to vote.

[142] And he asks, he implores, in some telling his colleagues to join him against what might be some of their inclinations to oppose the commission.

[143] On this vote, the yeas are 54, the nays are 35, the motion is not agreed to.

[144] And so the measure fails in the Senate.

[145] Right.

[146] And with it, any possibility of an independent commission, exploring January 6th the way an independent commission explored September 11th.

[147] That's exactly right.

[148] We'll be right back.

[149] So, Luke, with the best model out there, this gold standard investigation and independent commission no longer possible, what options are left?

[150] What happens?

[151] Well, there were a few options.

[152] President Biden could have appointed a commission.

[153] There was a presidential commission that investigated the JFK assassination.

[154] and also the attack on Pearl Harbor.

[155] But there was some hand -rigging about if President Biden appointed it, would it look like he was investigating his predecessor?

[156] Maybe that would look bad.

[157] So the option that Speaker Nancy Pelosi settled on was to appoint a select committee, which can be given a specific task to do with a specific focus.

[158] So she went ahead and drafted a proposal to have a select committee, which would have eight of her appointees and five nominees from the Republicans.

[159] So bipartisan in theory?

[160] Yes.

[161] So she starts off with her eight appointees.

[162] And then Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader, nominates his five individuals.

[163] That's when a monkey wrench gets.

[164] thrown into the proceedings.

[165] Among the five Republicans that Kevin McCarthy offered up were two that Democrats, the rank -and -file Democrats, found completely unacceptable.

[166] And they start inundating Speaker Pelosi with calls to object to their inclusion.

[167] And who are those two Republicans?

[168] The first is Congressman Jim Jordan.

[169] My hunch is the reason we didn't have the back up there for those good Capitol Hill police officers is because what happened in the summer of 2020, Laura, Democrats normalized anarchy.

[170] Who Democrats objected to, in part because he met with Donald Trump in December and helped plan the objections to the election on January 6th.

[171] They said he was a potential witness that the committee could call and therefore could not serve on the committee.

[172] The other was Congressman Jim Banks.

[173] The more you ask these questions and unravel the facts about January 6th, the more you get into a line of questions that go up a chain of command that end up on Speaker Pelosi's desk.

[174] What we know is that the Capitol...