On Friday, NBC News reported that new transcripts released by the House January 6 Select Committee reveal law enforcement officials were sounding the alarm about possible violence in the days leading up to the attack on the U.S. Capitol.
"Many of the revelations came in interviews with high-ranking individuals such as former Secret Service and White House official Anthony Ornato; former executive director of the National Capitol Threat Intelligence Center Donell Harvin; former Deputy FBI Director David Bowdich; Metropolitan Police Chief Robert Contee; former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund; and House Staff Director Jamie Fleet," reported Ryan J. Reilly. "But some of the new information came from questions posed to those officials by Jan. 6 committee staffers based on details they had gathered in the course of the 18-month investigation."
"Much of that information, mentioned by investigators during the interviews, was not included in the appendix of the committee's final report that addressed law enforcement and intelligence failures," said the report. "For the most part, Jan. 6 committee leaders decided against focusing the final report on how law enforcement came to be so underprepared for the attack."
According to the report, one FBI employee actually flagged extremist behavior in a December 26, 2020 memo, highlighting planning for what seemed to be radicals mobilizing in D.C. based on comments on an online forum, TheDonald.
"“They think they will have a large enough group to march into DC armed, and it will outnumber the police so they can’t be stopped," said the memo. "They believe that since the election was stolen, that it’s their constitutional right to over take the government and during this coup no U.S. laws apply. Another group of Proud Boys will be in DC already and are planning on blocking the roads with their cars in order to stop traffic."
Ornato, for his part, went on to dispute claims by the committee's star witness Cassidy Hutchinson, claiming he knew nothing about former President Donald Trump lunging at a Secret Service agent driving him and trying to seize the steering wheel when he refused to take the former president to the Capitol to join the insurrectionists.
