Whistleblower Claims Capitol Police Botched Jan. 6 Response and Lied to Congress About It
Over the course of the next several months, we are going to learn quite a bit about the events of January 6th, but not everything that we hear is going to be taken at face value.
This is due to the fact that the select committee investigating the attempted insurrection has been largely seen as a partisan affair after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi barred certain members of the Republican Party from participating, forcing the GOP to rescind all of their picks. Regardless of the merit of the endeavor, the phony left v. right paradigm is likely to taint the results.
But, outside of the committee’s work, there are truly worrisome revelations coming to light, and it could change the way that we view the event entirely.
A former high-ranking Capitol Police official with knowledge of the department’s response to the Jan. 6 attack has sent congressional leaders a scathing letter accusing two of its senior leaders of mishandling intelligence and failing to respond properly during the riot.
The accusations were heavy, to say the least.
The whistleblower, who requested anonymity for privacy reasons and left the force months after the attack, sent the 16-page letter late last month to the top members of both parties in the House and Senate. His missive makes scorching allegations against Sean Gallagher, the Capitol Police’s acting chief of uniformed operations, and Yogananda Pittman, its assistant chief of police for protective and intelligence operations — who also served as its former acting chief.
The whistleblower accuses Gallagher and Pittman of deliberately choosing not to help officers under attack on Jan. 6 and alleges that Pittman lied to Congress about an intelligence report Capitol Police received before that day’s riot. After a lengthy career in the department, the whistleblower was a senior official on duty on Jan. 6.
And that’s not all:
The whistleblower’s criticism went beyond Capitol Police leaders to Congress. Without naming specific lawmakers, his letter accuses congressional leaders of having “purposefully failed” to tell the truth about the department’s failures.
The January 6th select committee made other headlines this week as well, after seeing several of their subpoenas defied by former White House officials and Trump aides, with the former President instructing them to claim “executive privilege” in the matter.