The Capitol Riot: Documents You Should Read (Part 1)

[National Security Archives]

"Washington, D.C., January 13, 2021 - The Pentagon’s timeline of its response to the January 6, 2021 mob attack on the U.S. Capitol features multiple discrepancies with the public record, while the first federal indictment of mob participants details the specific legal charges that likely will be brought against others, according to the documents in the National Security Archive’s first "January 6 Sourcebook" posted today.

The Sourcebook, subtitled “documents you should read,” includes:

* the Dissent Channel message signed by more than 100 State Department employees denouncing the attack as undermining the U.S. promotion of democracy abroad (published by Josh Rogin of the Washington Post in his Twitter feed);

* the earlier 2006 FBI report warning of white supremacists’ influence in far-right circles, released by the House Oversight Committee;

* the Department of Homeland Security threat assessment from October 2020 warning that violent white supremacy was “the most persistent and lethal threat in the Homeland” (published by Lawfare);

* the FBI poster “seeking information” on “violence at the U.S. Capitol”;

* the text of the speech by President Trump at the Ellipse just prior to the mob marching on the Capitol (published and annotated by the Washington Post);

* the Congressional Research Service report detailing the steps Congress was taking to certify the presidential election vote when the mob interrupted (posted by Steve Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists); and

* the federal grand jury indictment of one of the mob members, Mark Leffingwell, citing five different sections of the U.S. Code violated by the mob. (First reported by Josh Gerstein of Politico.)
 

The January 6 Sourcebook publication marks the beginning of a systematic campaign by the Archive, a champion of the Freedom of Information Act, to use the FOIA to open the documentary record of what the government knew and when, and what the government did and didn’t do and when, about the mob attack on the Capitol. Archive staff have already drafted more than 75 specific, targeted FOIA requests to multiple federal agencies..."
Capitol Riot (part 1)