DC mayor offers blistering assessment of law enforcement's failed security efforts on Jan. 6

30 December 2022

The mayor of Washington, D.C., recently gave a blistering testimony to the House Select Committee investigating the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

According to HuffPost, Mayor Muriel Bowser's (D) remarks were included as part of a new testimony transcript released by the committee on Thursday, December 29.

“People thought they were friendly to law enforcement and that they loved their country,” Bowser said in the transcript. “People didn’t think that these white nationalists would overthrow the Capitol building.”

At one point during the testimony, Bowser also placed blame on the U.S. Department of Defense for their failure to respond in a timely manner.

According to Bowser, former President Donald Trump's mob of supporters had made their aggressive stance abundantly clear back in December 2020.

“In December ... we had a flurry of these white nationalist groups come in and vandalize some of our churches; Proud Boys, so-called Proud Boys and the like,” Bowser recalled. “We had a lot of street antagonism and violence.”

She also told the committee, “That was the first time we saw those groups really disrupt and vandalize, and were very aggressive with the police. I think our experience with them in December showed us that they were antagonistic to law enforcement.”

Bowser's remarks came just days after that of William Walker, who was the director of Washington, D.C.'s National Guard at the time of the insurrection. Like Bowser, Walker also offered a critical take on law enforcement's handling of the aftermath on Jan. 6.

During his testimony, he admitted that he believes law enforcement would have been a lot stricter if the Capitol rioters were Black. According to the transcript of his testimony, he also admitted that he thinks many rioters would have been killed under different circumstances.

“I saw enough to where I would have probably been using deadly force,” Walker testified. “I think it would have been more bloodshed if the composition would have been different.”

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