House Republicans hope that members of their conference named to the Democratic-controlled select committee formed to investigate the Jan. 6 riot could probe House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s actions ahead of the riot and direct attention to other “political violence” beyond the Capitol attack.
In a press conference on Tuesday, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise floated the idea of investigating what the top Democrat knew before the attack.
“There have been many questions raised about why there wasn’t a higher National Guard presence. It was supposedly offered,” Scalise said. “At what level was that rejected? I would hope they would look into that because that question really hasn’t been answered. How high up the chain did it go? Was it at the speaker’s level where they were offered National Guard protection on Jan. 6 and denied it?”
Pelosi’s office has repeatedly rejected suggestions that she was not consulted or contacted about any requests for National Guard presence on Jan. 6.
REPUBLICANS WORK TO TIE DEMOCRATS TO INFLATION
Scalise stopped short of calling on Pelosi to testify, saying that he will leave that up to members of the committee.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Monday announced that he appointed five Republican lawmakers to the select committee, with Indiana Rep. Jim Banks as the ranking member. Pelosi appointed seven Democrats, plus Trump critic Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming.
Scalise, echoing McCarthy’s previous statements, says that he hopes the committee will “look at the whole array of political violence that led up to Jan. 6 and still has gone on after that.”
Before Republicans blocked a bipartisan joint Jan. 6 commission proposal that would have given Republicans more control over the committee and a strict timeline, McCarthy and others had expressed opposition to a body that did not look into riots in Black Lives Matter protests last summer.
REPUBLICANS WORK TO TIE DEMOCRATS TO INFLATION
Scalise also brought up U.S. Capitol Police Officer Billy Evans, who died after a suspect who appeared to be a Nation of Islam leader rammed a car through a security checkpoint in April.
“There was a Capital Police officer killed after Jan. 6 that Pelosi, Speaker Pelosi, doesn’t want to look into that seems to be loaded by political violence,” Scalise said. “So let’s look at the whole array of political violence and what we can do to dial it down and get better control over it.”
