Republicans, including one whom House Speaker Nancy Pelosi excluded from the Jan. 6 select committee, are said to be writing their own rep...
Republicans, including one whom House Speaker Nancy Pelosi excluded from the Jan. 6 select committee, are said to be writing their own report addressing the security failures that led to the Capitol incursion.
Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana “has told colleagues Republicans will produce their own report documenting failures of preparation, activation on intelligence and inadequate equipment for Capitol Police,” according to Axios.
Further, he was slated to tell House Republicans on a Tuesday conference call that “GOP leadership staff have been conducting their own interviews with Capitol Police, their union and other officials to focus on the security failures that allowed the Capitol breach.”
Banks, along with Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, was prevented by Pelosi from serving on the Jan. 6 committee.
“Democrats fear nothing more than the truth,” Banks told Fox News host Laura Ingraham on Tuesday night.
“That’s why Nancy Pelosi kicked Jim Jordan and I off of the Jan. 6 committee, because we were already asking questions that Nancy Pelosi doesn’t want to answer.”
“We don’t know why she’s trying to cover up many of the facts about what happened on Jan. 6, but we know that she’s trying to cover it up. She’s covering up the truth,” he asserted.
Ingraham read a statement from GOP Rep. Rodney Davis of Illinois, ranking member of the House Administration Committee, which confirmed the lack of cooperation from House Sergeant at Arms William Walker.
“The House Sergeant at Arms, at the direction of the Speaker, has refused to provide us their communications surrounding January 6th,” Davis said.
“I believe those records will show that there was a lot of communication and coordination between the Speaker’s office and law enforcement officials leading up to and on January 6th.”
Jordan highlighted how important those communications could be in getting to the truth.
“You have conflicting testimony from that time period. The Capitol Hill Police has said that they asked for the National Guard to be present on Jan. 6. The sergeant at arms has said, ‘No, you didn’t,’” Jordan said.
The lawmaker pointed out that the day after the Capitol incursion, Pelosi called for then-Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving’s resignation, and now Walker, his replacement, won’t turn over the requested documents.
Banks argued that an assessment of security failures on Jan. 6 must be central to any true review of the events of that day.
“If we’re serious about making sure that another Jan. 6 never happens again, then we need to answer these important questions about the systemic breakdown of security at the top ranks of the U.S. Capitol Police, which report to Speaker Nancy Pelosi,” he said.
In a Sunday letter to House Republicans, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy wrote that Davis “will be sending a memo to each of your offices outlining meaningful and measurable steps that should be taken to protect our Capitol from all threats — steps that the current majority party is negligent in acting upon.”
McCarthy also noted that one year after the Capitol incursion, “the majority party seems no closer to answering the central question of how the Capitol was left so unprepared and what must be done to ensure it never happens again. Instead, they are using it as a partisan political weapon to further divide our country.”
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