The man at the center of a conspiracy theory popular among supporters of former President Donald Trump told the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riots that his life was turned upside-down after he was falsely accused of being an FBI plant.
As reported by NBC News, January 6 demonstrator Ray Epps described the turmoil in his life after being accused of urging Trump supporters to break into the Capitol to implicate them criminally at the behest of the FBI.
In particular, he said his home and business were both targeted by Trump fanatics who believed he had set up his fellow Trump supporters.
"We had a tour bus come by our home and our business with all these whacked out people in it," Epps told the committee. "There are good people out there that was in Washington. Those aren't the people that's coming by our house. This attracts — when they do this sort of thing, this attracts all the crazies out there."
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Epps was shown in a video the night before the riots telling people that they should go into the Capitol, but he told the committee he never intended to promote law breaking.
"The Capitol is the people's house and the rotunda — people can go into the rotunda and — and see what's happening there," he said. "My vision was, get as many people in there as we can and surround it, be there, let them know that we're not happy with the — with what — what has happened, and that was it. No violence."
Epps says his view of the demonstrations changed when Trump supporters started attacking Capitol police, which was when he decided to try to get some of them to back off and offered to assist officers in controlling the situation.
