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Republicans Are Blaming Pelosi for Jan. 6 Attack.


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The New York Times

Republicans Are Blaming Pelosi for Jan. 6 Attack. Their Claims Don't Add Up.

Nicholas Fandos
Wed, July 28, 2021, 7:21 AM
 
 

For months, Republican leaders have downplayed the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob. But on Tuesday, ahead of the first hearing of a special committee to investigate the riot, they took their approach to new and misleading extremes, falsely blaming Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the violence.

“The American people deserve to know the truth that Nancy Pelosi bears responsibility as speaker of the House for the tragedy that occurred on Jan. 6,” said Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., the party’s No. 3 leader.

It amounted to an audacious attempt to rewrite the history of the worst attack on the Capitol in two centuries and preempt the damning testimony of four police officers who were brutalized by the mob of Donald Trump’s supporters. Here’s how Republicans twisted the facts.

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Pelosi is not responsible for securing the Capitol.

Looking past the motivations of the mob or Trump, Republicans said it had been up to Pelosi and her leadership team to protect the Capitol from the attack, particularly given that intelligence gathered in the weeks before it occurred pointed to the potential for violence against Congress.

“On Jan. 6, these brave officers were put into a vulnerable, impossible position because the leadership at the top has failed,” said Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California, the minority leader.

Pelosi has considerable influence as the speaker, but she is not responsible for the security of Congress. That is the job of the Capitol Police, an agency Pelosi only indirectly influences. Most decisions about securing the Capitol are made by the Capitol Police Board, a body that consists of the House and Senate sergeants-at-arms and the Architect of the Capitol.

Pelosi shares control of the Capitol with the Senate majority leader, who at the time was Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. Republicans have made no attempt to blame McConnell for the security breach or for failing to prepare for attack.

That charge also contradicts a bipartisan report produced by a pair of Senate committees that found evidence of systematic failures across American intelligence, military and law enforcement agencies, which misjudged the threat leading up to Jan. 6 and were not properly trained to respond to it.

It also flatly contradicted congressional testimony, news reports and public accounts of that day, when Pelosi herself was one of the prime targets of the rioters, some of whom stalked the halls of the Capitol chanting ominously, “Nancy… Where are you. Nancy?”

Pelosi does not control National Guard requests for the Capitol.

McCarthy and others said that Pelosi had refused pleas by the Capitol Police to provide backup, like the National Guard, ahead of Jan. 6.

But the speaker of the House does not control the National Guard. And while Congress could have requested support in advance, that decision lies with the Capitol Police Board, not the speaker.

Members of the Capitol Police board have provided conflicting accounts of a debate that occurred on Jan. 4 over whether to request the help in advance. Steven A. Sund, then the chief of Capitol Police, has said he asked the board for the preemptive assistance but was rebuffed.

Among the reasons cited, Sund said, was a concern by the House sergeant-at-arms, Paul D. Irving, about the “optics” of bringing in reinforcements. Stefanik falsely attributed that concern to Pelosi, whose aides have said she only learned of the request days later.

A Times investigation detailed why it took nearly two hours to approve the deployment on Jan 6. After rioters breached the Capitol, Sund called Irving at 1:09 p.m. with an urgent request for the National Guard. Irving approached Pelosi’s staff with the request at 1:40 p.m., and her chief of staff relayed it to her at 1:43 p.m., when she approved it. But it would be hours more before Pentagon officials signed off on the deployment and informed the District of Columbia National Guard commander that he had permission to deploy the troops.

Pelosi was not briefed about warning signs before the attack.

Republicans repeatedly said that Pelosi had been warned as early as mid-December that demonstrations were being planned for Jan. 6 around Congress’ joint session to count the electoral votes.

That appeared to be a reference to early intelligence reports and warnings that began to circulate inside the Capitol Police on Dec. 14, which were evidently never shared widely enough to be acted upon.

But Pelosi’s aides say she was not briefed at the time about the threat, and the Senate’s joint report found that the warning signs were mixed at best until just days before the attack.

Senators — Republicans and Democrats alike — instead said the blame was with the Capitol Police and intelligence agencies for failing to properly assess and warn about the threats.

© 2021 The New York Times Company

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Republican leaders just have a hat with the names: Clinton, Pelosi, Schumer, AOC, and Soros in it, and they just randomly draw from it when they need someone to blame for something. Their supporters don't even care if it makes any sense, they just want to be told who they need to hate. 

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7 hours ago, homersapien said:

It wasn't an attack.  It was a typical tourist tour.

It wasn’t 100% mayhem. There was a lot of video of magas going in and out and following a rope lines very peacefully. Also plenty of video of what looks like capital police opening doors and letting people in without any resistance.

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46 minutes ago, jj3jordan said:

It wasn’t 100% mayhem. There was a lot of video of magas going in and out and following a rope lines very peacefully. Also plenty of video of what looks like capital police opening doors and letting people in without any resistance.

no saying it was wrong. no sorrow for those injured or died because of it. dissing police because it looks like there was no resistance. you throw shade on so much. you let your boy trump off even tho he told them to march and fight like hell. you are a special human being.

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40 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

no saying it was wrong. no sorrow for those injured or died because of it. dissing police because it looks like there was no resistance. you throw shade on so much. you let your boy trump off even tho he told them to march and fight like hell. you are a special human being.

Thanks fiddy. Trump did attempt to calm the crowd by tweet but alas his account was suspended. Should Jack Dorsey be accused of a crime? It is his fault Trump was unable to contact the hordes to quell their anger. So really he didn’t wait at all. 

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5 hours ago, jj3jordan said:

Thanks fiddy. Trump did attempt to calm the crowd by tweet but alas his account was suspended. Should Jack Dorsey be accused of a crime? It is his fault Trump was unable to contact the hordes to quell their anger. So really he didn’t wait at all. 

Excuses  only satisfy those who make them. A real leader would get out front and guide those he called to “fight like hell” in person. A tweet…that’s just plain stupid and cowardly. 

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5 hours ago, homersapien said:

Good grief.  It's twitter's fault???

Trump sits and watches this from the white house for hours and it's twitters fault?  :slapfh:

You are correct sir.  Could have all been avoided if Jack hadn’t suspended Trumps Twitter account. So simple and yet Jack’s partisan views that it is too dangerous for Trump to talk to his people prevented him from doing so.

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13 hours ago, creed said:

Excuses  only satisfy those who make them. A real leader would get out front and guide those he called to “fight like hell” in person. A tweet…that’s just plain stupid and cowardly. 

I would have loved for Trump to walk down there with them. Wish he had.

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51 minutes ago, jj3jordan said:

You are correct sir.  Could have all been avoided if Jack hadn’t suspended Trumps Twitter account. So simple and yet Jack’s partisan views that it is too dangerous for Trump to talk to his people prevented him from doing so.

BS. Get real. Even you can't be so obtuse to believe that excuse.

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2 hours ago, jj3jordan said:

You are correct sir.  Could have all been avoided if Jack hadn’t suspended Trumps Twitter account. So simple and yet Jack’s partisan views that it is too dangerous for Trump to talk to his people prevented him from doing so.

Sometimes, I honestly can't decide if you are just having fun trolling on this forum and don't actually believe half of what you write, or if you are dead serious in trying to make what you consider good faith arguments. 

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14 minutes ago, CoffeeTiger said:

 

Sometimes, I honestly can't decide if you are just having fun trolling on this forum and don't actually believe half of what you write, or if you are dead serious in trying to make what you consider good faith arguments. 

It's no fun seeing some of the comments that are posted on this forum.  No one in history has had more outright hatred thrown at them than Trump. From before he election to after.  

The truth is he tweets a lot. Agreed?  In order to hurt Trump personally, Jack Dorsey suspended his twitter account. Agreed?  Did his supporters receive any of his tweets after the rally participants walked to the capitol building in the daylight unarmed and enter the peoples house to make their voices known?  No. Agreed?  Did they shed any blood?  No. The only one to shed blood was the capitol policeman who shot an unarmed woman in the face from close range. Let me guess. He has ptsd now.

Trump was not my choice during the primaries but once he was the nominee he was the only choice. Hillary Clinton was a criminal, useless drunk with an entitlement ego twice a large as Trumps.  She belongs in prison, for real. Her server and classified violations are not even debatable. You or I would get hard prison time for one tenth of what she did. And desertion or treason for hanging Bengazi out to dry.  So I voted for Trump and you know what, no matter how much irrational hate you guys threw at him he still improved this country by leaps and bounds. You don't have to admit that because I know you can't. Inside you know that he actually did okay as president. If you don't want him again fine, but don't pretend that Joe Biden is anything more than milk toast, wait, not even that, as a person, leader, or president. He has lied plagiarized fondled and sniffed his way thru 47 years of public service on the dole without ever contributing anything to society. He actually did extort Ukraine, has now sold the white house out to China and Russia, broke up a perfectly good marriage so he could marry his crackhead son's babysitter, and daily blasphemes God Christians and the church by proudly proclaiming his support for abortion while demanding to be given the holy sacrament of communion. Oh yeah.. and he actually has said "you have my word as a Biden". What a joke.

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17 hours ago, jj3jordan said:

You are correct sir.  Could have all been avoided if Jack hadn’t suspended Trumps Twitter account. So simple and yet Jack’s partisan views that it is too dangerous for Trump to talk to his people prevented him from doing so.

Trump Says 'We Will Never Concede' as Mob Storms Capitol Building

Annie Karni, Maggie Haberman
6-7 minutes

Trump openly condones supporters who violently stormed the Capitol, prompting Twitter to lock his account.

06transition-briefing-trump-sub-articleL
“We will never concede,” President Trump said at a rally in front of the White House on Wednesday.
Credit...Pete Marovich for The New York Times
  • Jan. 6, 2021

President Trump on Wednesday evening openly condoned on social media the violence unfolding at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue after a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol, prompting Facebook and Twitter to remove his posts and lock his accounts.

“These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long,” Mr. Trump tweeted Wednesday evening, after spending much of the afternoon in the Oval Office watching footage of escalating violence unfolding on Capitol Hill. “Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!”

The tweet that appeared to prop up violent protesters as “patriots” and asserted baseless claims about the election outcome came after the president, under public and private pressure from advisers, had offered only a tepid response as the Capitol was breached for the first time in modern history and one woman died after being shot on the Capitol grounds.

Mr. Trump posted the message on both his Twitter and Facebook accounts. Facebook removed the post. Twitter first attached a warning label to the tweet that said it made a disputed claim about election fraud before removing the tweet atogether, claiming it “violated the Twitter Rules.”

In a follow-up message, Twitter said it was suspending the president’s Twitter feed for 12 hours — and possibly more if he did not delete his message — and threatened a permanent suspension if Mr. Trump violated its rules in the future. In doing so, the platform took away the president’s favorite method of communicating with his supporters directly, one he has used often since the election to spread false claims about widespread voter fraud.

Then, around 8:30 p.m. Wednesday night, a Facebook spokesman said officials had identified “two policy violations against President Trump’s Page,” and as a result, would block him from posting on the platform for 24 hours.

Even as former administration officials and Democratic leaders called on the president to tell his supporters to “go home,” Mr. Trump for hours did little to discourage them from storming the building. Instead, he issued two perfunctory tweets in which he asked them merely to remain “peaceful.”

“Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order — respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue,” he wrote, after shocking scenes of broken windows and waving Confederate flags in the Capitol had been playing on television for hours.

The Trump supporters had made their way to the Capitol at the president’s behest, after attending a rally near the White House, where he baselessly claimed the election results were fraudulent.

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It was only hours into the melee, and after an explosive device was found at the Republican National Committee headquarters, that Mr. Trump released a message telling the mob to leave.

“You have to go home now,” he said in a video message filmed at the White House and posted on Twitter. “We have to have peace. We have to have law and order. We don’t want anyone hurt.” Still, the president ultimately offered encouragement to the mob, noting: “We love you. You’re very special,” and “I know how you feel.”

But many advisers around the president were worried that his message in the video was not forceful enough and that some of his supporters would interpret it as encouragement to continue fighting for him.

Alyssa Farah, who resigned last month from her post as the White House communications director, tweeted a more direct message at the president’s supporters.

“Dear MAGA- I am one of you. Before I worked for @realDonaldTrump, I worked for @MarkMeadows & @Jim_Jordan & the @freedomcaucus,” she said, establishing her conservative bona fides. “I marched in the 2010 Tea Party rallies. I campaigned w/ Trump & voted for him. But I need you to hear me: the Election was NOT stolen. We lost.”

Earlier in the day the president had also encouraged his supporters with an alternate message. “We will never concede,” Mr. Trump said at the rally.

At the Capitol, some lawmakers who were taken to secure locations blamed the president for the uprising. “This is what the president has caused today, this insurrection,” Senator Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, said.

Some former administration officials publicly tried to encourage Mr. Trump to take a tougher stand to quell the escalating chaos, while other allies privately pressed him to do more. “The President’s tweet is not enough,” Mick Mulvaney, the former acting White House chief of staff, wrote on Twitter. “He can stop this now and needs to do exactly that. Tell these folks to go home.”

In a joint statement, Senator Chuck Schumer and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leaders, said, “We are calling on President Trump to demand that all protesters leave the U.S. Capitol and Capitol grounds immediately.”

But Mr. Trump resisted those private and public entreaties to make any outright condemnation of the violence. Instead, his ire was more focused on Vice President Mike Pence, who earlier in the day made clear that he planned to reject the president’s pressure to block congressional certification of Mr. Biden’s victory. Mr. Pence was evacuated from the Senate chamber as the tension escalated.

“Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution, giving States a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands the truth!” Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter.

 

here is proof you are either a liar or a dumbass. probably both. you like to rewrite history as well it seems. good lord dude tell the truth for once.

 

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Business Insider

Nearly half of Republicans say 'a time will come when patriotic Americans have to take the law into their own hands,' new poll shows

John Haltiwanger
Thu, July 29, 2021, 2:34 PM·3 min read
 
 
Stop the St
 
Pro-Trump protesters gather in front of the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021. Brent Stirton/Getty Images
  • A new poll offers an alarming picture of GOP beliefs about democracy.

  • Almost half of Republicans said a time might come where they have to take the law into their own hands.

  • A majority of Republicans endorsed potentially using force to uphold the "traditional" America.

  • See more stories on Insider's business page.

Less than a year after a pro-Trump mob stormed the US Capitol, nearly half of Republican voters (47%) say that "a time will come when patriotic Americans have to take the law into their own hands," per a new nationwide survey by George Washington University's School of Media and Public Affairs.

Only about 29% of Americans agreed with this statement on some level, the poll found, including just 9% of Democrats. And 49% said they disagree or strongly disagree.

The poll also found that a majority of Republicans (55%) say "the traditional American way of life is disappearing so fast we may have to use force to save it." About 15% of Democrats agreed with this statement, but more Americans disagreed (46%) than agreed (34%).

More Republicans (27%) than Democrats (18%) said that "strong leaders sometimes have to bend the rules in order to get things done."

The poll also found extremely low levels of trust among Republicans when it comes to elections - 82% said it's "hard to trust the results of elections when so many people will vote for anyone who offers a handout." Only 15% of Democrats were on the same page.

Echoing other recent polls on the 2020 election, the survey found that just 20% of Republicans were confident in the 2020 election results as compared to over 90% of Democrats.

The survey of of 1,753 registered US voters was conducted by YouGov from June 4 to 23.

Over the course of the Trump era, experts on democracy repeatedly raised concerns about the GOP's slide into authoritarianism. Democracy scholars have continued to raise alarm as the GOP-led legislatures in states across the country push for restrictive voter laws, employing similar justifications to President Donald Trump's baseless claims of mass voter fraud after he fairly lost the 2020 election. Along these lines, an ex-Trump administration official recently referred to the Republican party as the top national security threat to the US.

More than one quarter of Americans qualify as having right-wing authoritarian political beliefs, according to polling from Morning Consult released in late June.

Though Trump provoked an insurrection at the Capitol and stands as the only commander-in-chief in history to be impeached twice, he continues to be the leader of the Republican party. GOP leaders in Congress have also railed against a House investigation into the January 6 insurrection.

During a hearing on Tuesday held by the House select committee running the probe, four police officers testified about the violence they were subjected to by Trump's supporters at the Capitol. One officer referred to the insurrections as "terrorists," and another said the Capitol riot amounted to an "attempted coup."

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On 7/30/2021 at 11:00 AM, homersapien said:

I'm surprised no one has blamed Hillary.

How many Benghazi investigations were there?

hillary is too busy eatting babies in the babies of that pizza shop......

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