🚨 DC National Guard chief says Pentagon leaders told Capitol officials sending Guard troops to Capitol could "incite" rioters further and that their "best military advice" would be to reject sending support.
They wanted Army secretary on the call but he was busy w/ SecDef.
WALKER says on a 2:30 call with Capitol officials and Pentagon leaders, two Lt. Gens. — Walter Piatt and Charles Flynn (Mike Flynn's brother) worried about optics of sending guard to Capitol.
WALKER also said they wanted Army Secretary McCarthy on that call too, but he was not able ot join because he was meeting with Acting SecDef Miller. politico.com/news/2021/03/0…
WHAT'S CLEAR: The Pentagon stripped the DC National Guard chief of his quick-reaction authority, worried about optics and delayed real-time approval of aid to the Capitol.
Hard to see how Miller/McCarthy aren't the next to be called to testify.
JOHNSON now claiming that the conspiracy theory he pushed at the last hearing is justified because the indictment for the Oath Keepers describes them as a key driver of Jan. 6 violence.
DHS offical Melissa Smislova says perpetuating false narratives about the outcome of the 2020 election "could continue to mobilize or incite people to commit violence."
BLUNT tells reporters that today's testimony "definitely" will require asking questions of Army Secretary MCCARTHY and former acting SecDef MILLER about their role in the Capitol security response.
It may or may not require public testimony, he says.
Natsec/Intel officials keep vacillating between downplaying the Jan. 5 intelligence about the Capitol violence as "raw" and completely unreliable, and emphasizing how quickly they acted to share it with other law enforcement allies.
They seem very unsure how to characterize it.
UPDATE: Congress' investigation of the Jan. 6 insurrection and Capitol security lapses is now firmly focused on the 3hr delay between SUND's desperate plea for help and Acting Sec. Miller's final approval to deploy the National Guard
NEW filing documents one of the most brutal Jan. 6 assaults on Capitol police. Prosecutors are asking to hold Clayton Ray Mullins, who allegedly joined an assault on officers as they attempted to retreive Rosanne Boyland's body, one of five who died.
An image documenting the assault was partially redacted because Boyland was visible in it.
"Boyland’s associate, Justin Winchell, was attempting tobring Boyland’s body forward to law enforcement when the assaults of Officers A.W., B.M., and C.M. began."
MULLINS was later identified by someone who has a "30-year-banking relationship" with him, and he was spotted on Feb, 4 surveillance footage at his bank.
NEW: Prosecutors are beginning to fill in the details of the Proud Boys assault on the Capitol, revealing details about their financing, planning and operations in a new court filing against leader Ethan Nordean.
@joshgerstein Among other tactics Nordean helped orchestrate, per the filing: Dressing 'incognito' to avoid detection, spreading out at multiple Capitol entrances and recruiting"normies" — non Proud Boys — to join in the assault. politico.com/news/2021/03/0…
TODAY: The House's acting sergeant-at-arms will testify that on Jan. 6, the only way authorities knew to find lawmakers trapped in their offices was if his staff was contacted directly. He's advocating for a better system to communicate where lawmakers are in an emergency.
Acting sergeant-at-arms Tim Blodgett will also testify that he plans to introduce "emergency training for members on the House floor" and urges lawmakers to participate.
Notably, two of the three Republicans on the appropriations subcommittee holding this Capitol security hearing supported Trump's impeachmnent.
NEW: There are some disastrous aspects of what went wrong with security on Jan. 6, but it all seemed to culminate in this 2:28 p.m. conference call, when the Pentagon heard pleas for help — and didn't respond for hours.
When you hear lawmakers like Sen. Johnson suggest that the armed insurrection wasn't an armed insurrection, recall former Capitol Police Chief Sund's description:
"These criminals came prepared for war."
In unannounced testimony at Senate hearing, Capitol Police Captain Mendoza describes experience of facing the Jan. 6 rioters.
She notes rioters deployed "Military grade CS gas" inside the Capitol and received chemical burns to her face.
NEW: It’s hard to believe but today is Congress’ first chance to demand answers from key officials who oversaw the botched security response that allowed an armed insurrection to overtake the Capitol.
"Lindell—a talented salesman and former professional card counter—sells the lie to this day because the lie sells pillows."
Quite an opening to the Dominion defamation suit:
"While Lindell was on Facebook blaming Antifa for the storming of the Capitol by people shouting 'Fight for Trump,' MyPillow was offering discounts to people who used the
promotional code 'FightForTrump' at checkout."
"MyPillow began offering a promotion where if customers entered the promo code 'QAnon” at check out, they would receive a $45 discount—a not-so-subtle nod to the 45th President of the United States."