New Report Reveals Mike Pence “Tried To Assert Control,” Demanded Pentagon Officials “Clear The Capitol” As He Hunkered Down During Insurrection

Well, Trump did say it would be "wild."


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Republicans would like nothing better than for us to move on after Trump supporters besieged the U.S. Capitol, delaying the certification of Joe Biden while tearing at the very fabric of our democracy. Americans watched in horror as hordes of MAGA rioters broke into the U.S. Capitol on Jan 6, breaking through windows, pressing up the stairways, and hunting down elected officials with gallows erected outside the building.

At one point, the mob chanted, “Hang Mike Pence” over the former vice-president refusing to help Trump overturn the election results. The Associated Press reports how dire that situation was.

“From a secure room in the Capitol on Jan. 6, as rioters pummeled police and vandalized the building, Vice President Mike Pence tried to assert control, the AP reports. “In an urgent phone call to the acting defense secretary, he issued a startling demand.”

“Clear the Capitol,” Pence said.

“At 4:08 p.m. on Jan. 6, as the rioters roamed the Capitol and after they had menacingly called out for Pelosi, D-Calif., and yelled for Pence to be hanged, the vice president was in a secure location, phoning Christopher Miller, the acting defense secretary, and demanding answers,” the report continues.

“There had been a highly public rift between Trump and Pence, with Trump furious that his vice president refused to halt the Electoral College certification,” the AP reports. “Interfering with that process was an act that Pence considered unconstitutional. The Constitution makes clear that the vice president’s role in this joint session of Congress is largely ceremonial.”

“Pence’s call to Miller lasted only a minute,” the report states. “Pence said the Capitol was not secure and he asked military leaders for a deadline for securing the building, according to the document.”

“By this point, it had already been two hours since the mob overwhelmed Capitol Police unprepared for an insurrection,” the report adds. “Rioters broke into the building, seized the Senate and paraded to the House. In their path, they left destruction and debris. Dozens of officers were wounded, some gravely.”

Interestingly, it’s Republicans that want the barrier taken down around the Capitol. However, arrests are still being made, so the fencing should stay up — for now.

You can read the full report here.

Featured image via Gage Skidmore/Flickr, under Creative Commons license 2.0

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