How Trump and Republicans in Congress are manipulating the Capitol riot, six months later

Sign up for the daily Inside Washington email for exclusive US coverage and analysis sent to your inbox Get our free Inside Washington email Get our free Inside Washington email SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Marking the six-month anniversary of the attack, Mr Gosar issued a statement from his congressional office pledging to investigate her death, claiming that “President Trump has joined me in seeking the truth.” In the wake of the assault, the far right has increasingly found an ally in the Arizona congressman, a prominent “Stop the Steal” proponent who has called Joe Biden a “fraudulent usurper” who won the election in a “coup.” He joined 20 GOP lawmakers to refuse to honour law enforcement that protected them on 6 January, and during committee hearings with federal law enforcement officials about the riot response, he claimed that Ms Babbitt “was executed in cold blood by an unidentified killer” who was “lying in wait” to kill her. Mr Gosar claimed that “there is a determined effort to cover up the full circumstances of this homicide and the American people won’t stand for it.” He has previously suggested that the FBI, with support from Democratic officials, intentionally provoked the attack that injured dozens of law enforcement officers and threatened elected officials in order to entrap Trump supporters – an echo of the “deep state” narrative that has propelled far-right QAnon conspiracists, among others. He also claimed that “we do not allow the execution of citizens by street ‘justice’ in our country” and that “we have rejected vigilantism and police abuse for generations.” He has also called the killing of racial justice protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin “100 % justified.” The congressman has called for a “fair investigation” into Ms Babbitt’s death, despite his rejection of both a select committee investigation and bipartisan probe into the Capitol attack, where such questions could be asked with subpoena power. At least 136 of them are sitting members of Congress who voted against Mr Biden’s electoral college victory, Republican candidates in state and local elections across the US “are increasingly focused on the last election – running on the falsehood spread by Trump and his allies that the 2020 race was stolen from him.” At least six of them attended the riot on 6 January.