There are no excuses for the unmitigated failure to secure the Capitol against the riots on Wednesday.
It is mind-boggling that Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund hasn’t yet resigned. Sund and his intelligence chief, Yogananda Pittman, should be fired without delay. More security questions must also be asked of Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser and of the Trump administration. Still, we should be cautious before rushing to judge front-line Capitol Police officers. This bears note for two reasons.
For a start, some commentators are suggesting that the police actively enabled the protesters. One video widely circulated on social media appears to show officers opening a barrier to allow protesters to get closer to the Capitol. To be sure, that incident and others deserve attention and investigation. But we shouldn’t rush to judgment. It is possible, for example, that the officers who opened the barrier were at risk of being surrounded or rushed and that they believed removing the barriers might cool the crowd’s temper. It is also possible that the police were ordered to retreat to another position. For another example, police officers are trained that stampede charges can kill people during a protest. Did this concern enter into their calculation?
Others are claiming that the police treated the Capitol rioters better than black people have been treated at Black Lives Matter protests. CNN’s Van Jones argued that what we saw yesterday encapsulated deep racial bias.
Perhaps, but I’m not so sure. First, there is abundant footage of police officers tolerating violent disorder at Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. But let’s recall the situation that police officers found themselves in on Wednesday. They were greatly outnumbered, with just a few officers attempting to hold back thousands of protesters in some cases. The police thus faced a situation in which they had to balance their responsibility to preserve order with their exigent responsibility to preserve life. They had to weigh whether their use of greater force against rioters would assist in restoring order or lead to escalation and the risk of more serious injuries. Considering the hyperemotional dynamic of these riots — many of those interviewed or otherwise recorded on camera seemed to believe they were heirs to Paul Revere and the American Revolution — police officers could credibly believe that their miscalculation might be mortal.
The tragic death of Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt, who was shot by officers, illustrates the very difficult calls that were made. We know that officers were at times beaten and overwhelmed. This reality should give us pause before judging officers such as the one who took a selfie with a rioter. Was that officer right to pose? No. But considering that he was isolated amid a hostile crowd, his actions deserve a little more sympathy than they’re getting.
The key is that a full investigation is needed here. We need to know what decisions were made, why, when, and by who. But before we admonish these police officers, many of whom stood their ground at great risk yesterday, we should look to their leadership.
