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The U.S. Capitol Police chief says intelligence failed to predict the Jan. 6 domestic terrorist attack.
On Wednesday, acting U.S. Capitol Police Chief Yogananda Pittman said the agency planned on taking action ahead of the Jan. 6 riot after receiving intelligence that domestic terrorists were planning on being armed during their earlier rally. However, she says intelligence failed to predict the outline of the attack, which led to officers being outnumbered at the time of the U.S. Capitol attack.
Pittman said if they had had better information, the U.S. Secret Service would not have had Mike Pence oversee the November election certification. Pence was a target of the domestic terrorists, CNN reports.
“The Department’s preparations were based on the information it gathered from its law enforcement partners like the FBI and others within the intelligence community, none of which indicated that a mass insurrection of this scale would occur at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6,” Pittman said in her testimony, which was released ahead of a House Appropriations Committee hearing on Thursday.
“Nor did the intelligence received from the FBI or any other law enforcement partners include any specific credible threat that thousands of American citizens would attack the U.S. Capitol,” she added. “Indeed, the United States Secret Service brought the Vice-President to the Capitol for the election certification that day because they were also unaware of any specific credible threat of that magnitude.”
Pittman said four intelligence assessments were put together by the department’s s Intelligence and Interagency Coordination Division. The final assessment state that white supremacists and extremist groups would be armed and participating in the rally. Capitol Police placed Dignitary Protection Agents at some congressional leaders’ homes in response to the final assessment. They also deployed agents from that same unit to the Ellipse to protect members of Congress. Pittman says intelligence told them to anticipate the protest but not the attack.
Acting House Sergeant at Arms Timothy Blodgett said that his USCP bulletin warned that there would be some violence. “The January 3rd intelligence assessment from the Capitol Police has been touted as including information that makes it clear that Jan. 6 would become violent,” Blodgett will say.” Indeed, on page 13 of the document, the assessment states that ‘[t]his sense of desperation of and disappointment may lead to more of an incentive to become violent. Unlike previous post-election protests, the targets of the pro-Trump supporters are not necessarily the counter-protesters as they were previously but, rather, Congress itself is the target on the 6th.’ Taken by itself, the language is a warning,” he added.
