Thread by @jbendery

Good morning! ☕️

In a few mins, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol is holding its first hearing with a panel of police officers who were fighting the mob that day.

There will be new, violent video footage presented, per committee aides.

Hearing is expected to go about 2.5 hours.

Dem chairman Bennie Thompson will give opening remarks, followed by Republican Rep. Liz Cheney.

I think you can watch it online here, but there's no livestream going yet. c-span.org/video/?513434-…

Members of the committee are currently greeting the panel of police officers set to testify.

Some get handshakes, some get hugs.

Rep. Bennie Thompson kicks off the hearing.

"We are going to be guided solely by the facts. The facts of what happened on January 6th, in the run-up to that tragic day, and what has taken place since.... There’s no place for politics or partisanship in this investigation."

Thompson lists off things the committee already knows about the Jan. 6 attack:

--"Vicious assaults on law enforcement."

--"A coordinated, planned attack."

-- Attackers "wanted to derail the peaceful transfer of power in this country."

-"Seven people lost their lives."

"And while our institutions endured, and while Joe Biden is the legitimately elected President of the United States, a peaceful transfer of power didn’t happen this year," says Thompson.

"Let that sink in. A peaceful transfer of power didn’t happen this year."

As this hearing unfolds, don't forget that just hours after this deadly attack, 147 Republicans *still* voted to overturn the election based on the same lie about voter fraud that fueled the attack in the first place.

Here are all of their names. huffpost.com/entry/republic…

The faces of these police officers as the committee plays violent footage from the Jan. 6 attack.

"Let’s be clear. The rioters who tried to rob us of our democracy were propelled here by a lie," says Thompson. "As chairman of this Committee, I will not give that lie any fertile ground."

"We need to understand how and why the Big Lie festered."

Liz Cheney is up.

"Every American owed you our undying gratitude," Cheney tells the panel of officers.

Cheney says everyone on today's committee preferred to set up an independent, bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection + voted to do so, but it "was opposed by my own leadership."

"I have been a conservative Republican since 1984," says Cheney. "I have disagreed sharply on policy and politics with almost every Democratic member of this committee."

"But in the end, we are one nation under God.... This investigation must be nonpartisan."

The officers testifying today:

-Harry Dunn, Private First Class, U.S. Capitol Police
-Aquilino Gonell, Sergeant, U.S. Capitol Police
-Michael Fanone, Officer, Metropolitan Police Department
-Daniel Hodges, Officer, Metropolitan Police Department

Officer Gonell says Jan. 6 rioters called him a "traitor" + "disgrace."

Some said that "I, I, an Army veteran & a police officer, should be executed."

Some said, "If you shoot us, we all have weapons, we will shoot back."

"Or, 'We'll get our guns. We outnumber you. Join us.'"

"I heard specific threats to the lives of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and then also Vice President Mike Pence," says Gonell.

"My fellows officers and I were punched, kicked, shoved, sprayed with chemical irritants and even blinded with eye-damaging lasers."

Some rioters wore tactical gear, says Gonell, including bulletproof vests and gas masks. Some used hammers, knives, batons stolen from cops.

"I was particularly shocked at seeing the insurrectionists violently attack us with the very American flag that they claimed to protect."

Gonell says he remembers losing oxygen while being attacked + thinking this is how he would die.

"I later find out my wife and relatives were ... frantically calling and texting me," he says, wiping tears from his face. "They were watching the turmoil on television."

Gonell said he couldn't respond to his family's texts until hours later, after giving CPR to a rioter, and then couldn't let his wife hug him later because he had chemicals all over his uniform. His skin was burning and he couldn't sleep. Back at the Capitol at 8am.

Gonell said he worked for 15 consecutive days until after the inauguration.

"I made sure to work despite my injuries because I wanted to continue doing my job, securing the Capitol complex," he says. "More than 6 months later, I'm still trying to recover from my injuries."

Officer Michael Fanone on Jan. 6: "I participated in the defense of the United States Capitol from an armed mob -- an armed mob -- of thousands determined to get inside. I was among the vastly outnumbered group of law enforcement officers protecting the Capitol."

"I was grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country," says Fanone.

"I was at risk of being stripped of and killed with my own firearm, as I heard chants of, 'Kill him with his own gun.' I could still hear those words in my head today."

"It was unlike any scene I had ever witnessed," Fanone says of being pulled into the mob.

"I heard someone scream, 'I got one!' As I was swarmed by a violent mob, they ripped off my badge. They grabbed and stripped me of my radio..... They began to beat me."

"At one point I came face to face with an attacker, who repeatedly lunged for me and attempted to remove my firearm," says Fanone.

"I heard chanting from the crowd, 'Get his gun! And kill him with his own gun!'"

"I was electrocuted again and again and again with a taser," says Officer Fanone. "I'm sure I was screaming, but I don't think I could even hear my own voice."

Fanone says he thought about using his gun, but knew he was outnumbered.

"So I decided to appeal to any humanity they might have. I said as loud as I could manage, 'I've got kids.' Thankfully, some in the crowd stepped through and ... inched me toward the Capitol."

"The indifference shown to my colleagues is DISGRACEFUL," shouts Fanone, smacking the table, referring to Republican lawmakers downplaying and denying the events of Jan. 6 attack.

They "betray their oath of office."

Officer Michael Hodges is up now, repeatedly describing the mob as "terrorists." Describes a sea of US flags, Trump flags, Christian flags.

"It was clear the terrorists perceived themselves to be Christians."

One flag read: "Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president."

"Men alleging to be veterans told us how they'd fought for this country and were fighting for it again," says Hodges.

"Another shouted, 'Do not attack us, we are not Black Lives Matter.'"

A man in QAnon hoodie said, "This is the time to choose which side of history to be on."

Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn is up.

Opens by saying he's "still hurting" from what happened that day and asks for a moment of silence to honor the late Officer Brian Sicknick, who died following injuries sustained in the Jan. 6 attack.

A reminder that Republican lawmakers have referred to Jan. 6 as "a normal tourist visit" and the white supremacist attackers as "peaceful patriots." huffpost.com/entry/republic…

Dunn says he saw rioters in the Capitol carrying a Confederate flag and a red MAGA flag.

"I decided to stand my ground to prevent any rioters from heading downstairs... because that's where officers were getting decontamination aid and were particularly vulnerable."

After the Capitol was cleared, Dunn says he sat with another Black officer and described "the racial slurs I endured."

"I became very emotional. I began yelling, 'How the blank could something like this happen?' I began sobbing. Officers came over to console me."

Dunn says he's sought counseling since Jan. 6 and urged his colleagues to do it too, if they need help.

"Lastly, to the rioters, the insurrectionists, the terrorists of that day: Democracy went on that night," says Dunn. "It still continues to exist today. Democracy is bigger than any one person and any one party.

"You all tried to disrupt democracy that day. You all failed."

Chairman Thompson asks Gonell to compare his military service in Iraq to the Jan. 6 attack:

"Totally different. This is our own citizens. People who we have sworn an oath to protect, but yet they are attacking us with the same flag they claim to represent. It was bad."

Liz Cheney: Trump said this was a "loving crowd." How does that make you feel?

Gonell: "Pathetic."

"If that was hugs and kisses, then we should all go to his house and do the same thing to him."

"Everything we did was to prevent everyone in the Capitol from getting hurt," says Gonell. "What [Trump] was doing, instead of sending the military or telling his people to stop ... he egged them on."

"All of them -- all of them -- were telling us Trump sent them."

Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger chokes up telling the officers he knows they feel broken from Jan. 6.

"But you guys won. You guys held. Even democracies are not defined by our bad days. We're defined by how we come back from bad days, how we take accountability for that."

Officer Fanone says he believes the Capitol attackers wanted to kill him on Jan. 6 because he got separated from other officers at one point and no longer posed any threat to anyone trying to get into the Capitol, "but yet, they tortured me."

"They beat me," said Fanone. "I was struck with a taser device at the base of my skull numerous times. They continued to do so until I yelled out that I have kids. I said that hoping to appeal to some of those individuals' humanity. Fortunately, a few did step in and intervene."

Officer Fanone says he didn't remember what happened when he was dragged back to safety with other officers because, as evidenced by his body camera footage, he was unconscious for about 4 minutes.

"We are all Americans today," says Kinzinger, choked up by the officers' bravery in the face of the mob. "I thank you for holding that line."

Our wrap on today's hearing with 4 officers who were beaten, electrocuted, sprayed w/ chemicals + called the n-word as they risked their lives to protect the Capitol on Jan. 6.

"I’m sure I was screaming but I don’t think I could even hear my own voice." huffpost.com/entry/police-o…