(Joshua Paladino, Headline USA) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., had direct ties to the U.S. Capitol’s security failures leading up to the Jan. 6, 2021, uprising, according to a new report that House Republicans released on Wednesday.
The GOP-led investigation found that Democrat leaders denied requests from security officials “again and again” for additional safeguards, including more armed officers and National Guard troops, Just the News reported.
“Prior to that day, the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) had obtained sufficient information from an array of channels to anticipate and prepare for the violence that occurred,” the report noted.
In early December, two of Pelosi’s staffers were meeting regularly with security officials to discuss plans for Jan. 6. One of Pelosi’s closest aides personally edited a security plan.
Then-House Sergeant-at-Arms Paul Irving “coordinated closely with the Speaker and her staff and left Republicans out of important discussions related to security,” the GOP report said.
Shortly after Jan. 6, however, Pelosi betrayed Irving and fired him.
Capitol Police Chief Steve Sund excoriated Pelosi in an email to Irving.
“For the Speaker’s knee-jerk reaction to yesterday’s unprecedented event…to immediately call for your resignation…after you have been denied again and again by Appropriations for proper security outfitting of the Capitol,” he wrote. “…again, for Congress to demand your resignation is spectacularly unjust, unfair, and unwarranted.”
The report alleged that Democrat leaders ignored security concerns to preserve peaceful “optics” on the day Congress received the Electoral College tallies from the states.
“Leadership and law enforcement failures within the U.S. Capitol left the complex vulnerable on January 6, 2021,” the report concluded. “The Democrat-led investigation in the House of Representatives, however, has disregarded those institutional failings that exposed the Capitol to violence that day.”
Beyond ignoring the true cause of the chaos on Jan. 6, the Democrats’ Jan. 6 committee, which is due to release its final report this week, has blamed President Donald Trump for the security failures and recommended criminal charges against him.
Republican Reps. Rodney Davis, Jim Banks, Troy Nehls, Jim Jordan and Kelly Armstrong compiled the report that put the most blame for Jan. 6 on Democrat leaders.
“Unlike the sham January 6th Committee, House Republicans produced a useful report that will keep out Capitol and USCP officers safe with no subpoena power and no budget,” Banks said.
