Thread by @pdmcleod

Acting Capitol police chief Pittman says 35 officers are under investigation for things like posing for selfies with Jan. 6 rioters, and six have had their police powers suspended.

Pittman says “well in excess” of 10,000 people left Trump’s speech near the White House on Jan. 6 and went to the Capitol. She estimates about 800 made it inside the building.

A perplexing story is coming out about an FBI report sent to Capitol police one day before the riots showing social media posts calling for war. "Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, and blood from their BLM and Pantifa slave soldiers being spilled.”

Per Pittman, the document was sent to FBI agents embedded with the Capitol police. They sent it to an officer in the protective and operations side of House security. This person did not send the report up the chain.

“That is a lesson learned,” said Pittman.

BUT Pittman says even if police leadership did see the report it wouldn’t have made any difference — “We do not believe that that document in and of itself would have changed our posture” — because it was consistent with social media posts they’d already seen.

An exasperated Rep. Tim Ryan asks why they weren’t prepared for the worst-case scenario.

Pittman says they were “already leaning forward” in terms of calling in more officers, expanding the perimiter.

Obviously it wasn’t near enough.

“Hindsight is 2020,” says Pittman.

Wow. It’s coming up on two months since the Capitol siege and Capitol police haven’t held a single press conference. Asked by Jennifer Wexton if they’ll commit to facing the press/public in the future, Pittman says no.

So the operating belief of Capitol Police leadership after a disastrous and historic failure is that they have no obligation to show their faces and take questions about what went wrong (unless Congress calls them to a committee; then they have no choice.)