'We could have stopped them': Capitol Police officer reportedly says he and others were sent home early
A U.S. Capitol police officer says he and others expected to work an extra shift but were sent home early last Wednesday, barely hours before thousands descended on Congress, broke in, and hunted for the Vice President and Speaker of the House in an insurrection incited by President Donald Trump and his closest allies.
Business Insider reports the officer, who is remaining anonymous, "was working the night shift last week and found it 'puzzling' that he and his colleagues were sent home earlier than expected on Wednesday. He also said nobody asked him to come back after the attack happened."
The officer "told Insider that he and others expected to pull an extra shift," and "said everybody in the department knew in advance that the Trump march was going to take place, and thought it would be an all-hands-on-deck situation." He even "packed a backpack full of coffee and protein bars, expecting to work into the afternoon after his regular shift ended at 7 a.m."
"Naively, I thought, well, they must know something that we don't. Maybe they have intel showing they're not going to come up on the Hill," he said. "Maybe they don't think they're that violent. I trusted that they knew what they were doing by letting us go home."
He says his wife woke him up telling him the insurrectionists had breached the Capitol. He "said he checked his phone, expecting to find a bunch of missed calls asking him to come into work, but was shocked to find none at all."
'We could have stopped them': Capitol Police officer reportedly says he and others were sent home early - Alternet.org
'Home-grown fascism': The storming of the US Capitol was even more 'sinister' originally thought
On Wednesday night, January 6, the dominant news story all around the world was the storming of the U.S. Capitol Building by far-right extremists who were hoping to prevent Congress from certifying President-elect Joe Biden's electoral college victory. More details about the January 6 rampage in Washington, D.C. have emerged since then, and in an article published this week, Associated Press reporters Jay Reeves, Lisa Mascaro and Calvin Woodward describe some of the ways in which that rampage was even more "sinister" than originally thought.
"Only days later is the extent of the danger from one of the darkest episodes in American democracy coming into focus," the AP journalists report. "The sinister nature of the assault has become evident, betraying the crowd as a force determined to occupy the inner sanctums of Congress and run down leaders — Trump's vice president and the Democratic House speaker among them. This was not just a collection of Trump supporters with MAGA bling caught up in a wave."
President Donald Trump demanded that Vice President Mike Pence prevent Congress from certifying the electoral college results, which Pence didn't have the power to do. And some of the fanatics who raged in Washington D.C., believing that Pence had betrayed Trump, wanted to murder the vice president. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was a target as well.
Reeves, Mascaro and Woodward explain, "'Hang Mike Pence!,' the insurrectionists chanted as they pressed inside (the Capitol Building), beating police with pipes. They demanded House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's whereabouts, too. They hunted any and all lawmakers: 'Where are they?' Outside, makeshift gallows stood, complete with sturdy wooden steps and the noose. Guns and pipe bombs had been stashed in the vicinity."
'Home-grown fascism': The storming of the US Capitol was even more 'sinister' originally thought - Alternet.org