{"id":4024,"date":"2021-02-03T17:39:17","date_gmt":"2021-02-04T01:39:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/faithrethink.com\/?p=4024"},"modified":"2024-01-06T11:48:17","modified_gmt":"2024-01-06T19:48:17","slug":"january-6-the-violent-insurrection-at-the-us-capitol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/faithrethink.com\/january-6-the-violent-insurrection-at-the-us-capitol\/","title":{"rendered":"January 6: The Violent Insurrection at the US Capitol"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the last article<\/a>, we looked at The Big Lie<\/a> about widespread voter fraud that President Trump continued to push in the months leading up to the election and in the following weeks after it. We considered how this lie was successful enough to persuade 72% of Republican voters<\/a> even after the election. We also discussed why the claim of widespread voter fraud lacks any viable evidence to support it. Trump used all the legal processes available to him, and still no widespread fraud has been found. The hard truth for many Trump supporters to swallow is that the election was not actually stolen. Donald J. Trump lost the election.<\/p>\n

The problem is that a high percentage of pro-Trump supporters have spent months feeding on The Big Lie, and Trump is not alone to blame. Quite the contrary. The reason the lie of widespread election fraud was so successful was that it was publicly promoted by many leading Republican Congressmen and Senators as well as far right news networks that consistently traffic in conspiracy theories. While some Congressional Republicans did not accept the lie, thankfully, and spent their energies debunking it, it was only a small handful of them and not enough to make a difference in persuading their base. The zealous rhetoric that “the election was stolen” had already spread like wildfire among Trump supporters.<\/p>\n

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Plans to Protest<\/h2>\n

Millions of Trump supporters disagreed with the election results as the polls indicated. Among them were a sizable portion of extremists and other fringe groups, prone to conspiracy theories, who took to heart President’s Trump’s election fraud claims and wanted to do something about it. After all, in their minds Trump should be president; not Biden.<\/p>\n

The call to “Stop the Steal,<\/a>” combined with other dark and toxic narratives, compelled thousands of pro-Trump supporters to make plans to gather at the Save America Rally not far from Capitol the second week of January. In a tweet on December 19th<\/a>, President Trump urged his supporters to join him in DC on January 6th. “Be there, will be wild!” A week later, on December 26th at 8:00 am, he amped up his rhetoric in a tweet<\/a> writing, “If a Democrat Presidential Candidate had an Election Rigged and Stolen, with proof of such acts at a level never seen before, the Democrat Senators would consider it an act of war, and fight to the death. Mitch and the Republicans do NOTHING! just want to let it pass. NO FIGHT!” Fourteen minutes later, he tweeted again saying, “The “Justice” Department and the FBI have done nothing about the 2020 Presidential Voter Fraud, the biggest SCAM in our nation’s history, despite overwhelming evidence. They should be ashamed. History will remember. Never give up. See everyone in D.C. on January 6th.” On the very next day, December 27th, he tweeted again, “See you in Washington, DC, on January 6th. Don’t miss it. Information to follow.” A few days later, on December 30th, he also tweeted, JANUARY 6TH. SEE YOU IN DC!” With over 88 million Twitter followers<\/a> at the time, his audience was far reaching among those who supported and voted for him.<\/p>\n

In each of the above tweets, President Trump signaled a call to action for his most ardent supporters to meet him at the Capitol on January 6th. But was he merely calling for them to peacefully protest? Or was he intending for them to do something much more aggressive, even violent? Was his statement about a rigged and stolen election taken as “an act of war” just an exaggeration, a simple figure of speech? Tragically, the events that would soon enfold just one week later strongly suggest that his statement was anything but figurative.<\/p>\n

And while some supporters came that week to protest the election results peacefully, others had something very different in mind. Of course, they had been primed for this moment<\/a> for quite some time (see my last blog article<\/a>).<\/p>\n

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A Routine Procedure: Counting the Electoral College Votes<\/h2>\n

On Wednesday, January 6th of this year, US Congressmen and Senators came together in their separate chambers to finalize the election process by performing the last steps first outlined in Article 2, Section 1 of The Constitution of the United States<\/a>\u00a0but later\u00a0updated in the Twelfth Amendment<\/a>, which is the procedure Congress now adheres to. In the Amendment, each state’s electoral votes are to be brought into the Senate Chamber and be counted by the President of the Senate (the Vice President of the United States, at the time Mike Pence). This is a routine procedure done every four years, two months following the November presidential election (the Tuesday following the first Monday in January<\/a>) to count the electoral votes that each state had already certified.<\/p>\n

But everything that happened that day was not a routine procedure. In fact, it was highly unusual.<\/p>\n

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Save America Rally<\/h2>\n

As the Senate gathered to count the electoral votes under the direction of Mike Pence, the Save the America Rally was well underway at the Ellipse just south of the White House. President Trump and other national figures spoke at the rally in order to persuade voters to do something about the election results. Here’s a few noteworthy remarks at the event (WARNING: They are offensive, false, and aggressive in nature):<\/p>\n