Capitol Cops Recall Assault on Congress: "I've never been called a nigger in this uniform"

The congressional commission of inquiry into the assault on the Capitol on January 6 began this Tuesday, within those same walls where the events took place, with the devastating testimonies of four police officers who suffered blows that go far beyond metaphors. of those days. One of them, Sergeant Aquilino Gonell, from the body that protects the Chambers, has said that he felt his oxygen drain as he faced the violent men who sought to boycott the confirmation of Joe Biden's electoral victory, which took place that day. This is how I am going to die, defending this entrance, he thought at the time, Gonell recalled. "I've never been called a nigger in this uniform in my life," said another agent, Harry Dunn. In front,a group of seven Democratic congressmen and two Republicans listened to them, but bipartisanship is a mirage: the latter two are a

rare bird

in his party, fierce critics of Donald Trump.

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As happened with the parliamentary trial of former President Trump held as a result of these riots (his second

impeachment

, for which he was acquitted, last February), Congress addresses this deeply divided process between the two parties and with the figure of the president and the congressmen acolytes hovering over the room.

On this day, a crowd of Trump supporters gathered in Washington to protest against the ratification of the result of the polls, convinced of the hoax of fraud that the Republican had been encouraging for months. That morning, he addressed his activists, encouraged them to keep protesting, and encouraged them to march to the Capitol. Then, a mob of about 800 people entered by force and forced the session to be suspended. Five people died, including police officer Brian Sicknick, although last April it was determined that it had been due to a cerebral infarction not related to the attacks. The number of officers injured that day amounted to 140.

“It looked like a medieval battle. We fight hand in hand, inch by inch to prevent invasion, ”said Sergeant Gonell, of the Capitol Police, this Tuesday. Agent Michael Fanone, of the metropolitan police, has related, for his part, how the assailants beat and grabbed him while calling him a "traitor" to his country. Another Capitol police officer, Harry Dunn, an African American, has noted that he was called a "nigger" several times. "This nigga voted for Biden," he said a woman told him. "Fucking nigga", he said another vandal snapped at him. "Never in my life have I been called a nigger wearing this uniform," he lamented, in a morning of emotional speeches.

Gonell and Fanone have also launched a political complaint directed at Republican legislators, who in their defense of the figure of Trump have tried to downplay the events and the tension that preceded them.

"There is a continuous and disconcerting attempt to ignore or try to destroy the truth of what happened that day and to adulterate the facts until they turn them into something different from what they undoubtedly reveal: an attack on our democracy by national extremists", Gonell has pointed out.

Fanone has criticized: "Nothing has prepared me to know how I should address those members of Congress who still deny the events of that day."

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The president of the House of Representatives, the powerful Democrat Nancy Pelosi, announced on June 24 the formation of a select committee to investigate the facts and causes of the January 6 assault, outside the work of the courts, and raise recommendations so that such a disaster is not repeated. The Republicans had already blocked in the Senate the creation of an independent Commission similar to the one that was formed in its day by the attacks of September 11, 2001.

The Democratic majority does make it possible in the lower house. Pelosi, who has decided on the final configuration of the committee, rejected the two members proposed by the leader of the Republican minority, Kevin McCarthy, and opted for Congressmen Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinguer, also Republicans, but notable opponents of Trump. "Never in the history of the United States has the speaker of the House of Representatives elected members of the other side, so they are predetermining what happens" with the investigation, McCarthy criticized.

This process runs parallel to the work of the police and the courts. More than 500 people have been arrested for crimes and misdemeanors of various kinds as a result of their participation in the revolt and the arduous work of reviewing each video fragment, each photograph, each one of those millions of images from that January 6 continues. who toured social media to identify offenders. Many of them were their own informers by publishing what they perceived as a feat. The first prison sentence for these events was handed down on July 19 against a tow truck operator from Tampa (Florida), who that day appeared in Washington, flag with the slogan "Trump 2020", at the ready. Paul Allard Hodgkins, 38, had pleaded guilty to obstructing the work of Congress and received an eight-month prison sentence.

Trump, who thanks to Republican support was acquitted of the second

impeachment

, continues to stir the hoax of electoral fraud and points to a possible new candidacy for the presidential elections of 2024.