A growing number of Republican lawmakers are refusing to say that the Jan. 6 insurrection was actually an insurrection.
Nearly two dozen GOP House members voted against legislation this week that would award Congressional Gold Medals to police officers who defended the Capitol that day, in part because it describes the mob of then-President Trump’s supporters who were trying to stop Congress from ratifying the 2020 election results as “insurrectionists.”
“They were protesting. And I don’t approve of the way they protested, but it wasn’t an insurrection,” said Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.).
“My goodness. Can you imagine what a real insurrection would look like?” he asked.
The lack of consensus among members of Congress about how to describe the Jan. 6 attack underscores how difficult it is for lawmakers to take actions such as establishing a bipartisan commission to investigate the day’s events, as well as the pervasiveness of GOP attempts to whitewash the severity of the violent attack on the Capitol.
Multiple news organizations, including The Hill, began referring to the events of Jan. 6 as an insurrection, broadly defined as an act of revolt against an established government, while they were still unfolding.
Following a “Stop the Steal” rally in Washington headlined by Trump and scheduled to coincide with Congress’s certification of November’s Electoral College results, hundreds of supporters of the former president stormed the Capitol to prevent the formal count and transfer of power. Seven people died in connection with the ensuing violence, including two suicides in the following days, and more than 520 have since been charged with offenses ranging from assault to unlawful entry — though none have been charged with sedition thus far.
The article of impeachment against Trump that the House passed after the riot, which fell short of conviction in the Senate, specifically referred to his actions as “incitement of insurrection” and “willfully inciting violence against the government of the United States.”
While the House passed legislation to award medals to the Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police overwhelmingly with broad support from both parties on Tuesday, a group of 21 Republicans voted against it in part because they believed its use of the term “insurrectionists” and description of the Capitol as the “temple of our American democracy” went overboard.
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A growing number of Republican lawmakers are refusing to say that the Jan. 6 insurrection was actually an insurrection. https://t.co/gaB5kLYmwd
— The Hill (@thehill) June 19, 2021
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