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Don't let the GOP off the hook: Republican leaders are responsible for the Capitol riot

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The words "Business Insider".Two crossed lines that form an 'X'. It indicates a way to close an interaction, or dismiss a notification.The on January 6 by a far-right, Trump-supporting mob was the kind of scene that observers of the modern American conservative movement have long feared was a possibility. Inspired by by the president and members of Congress like Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, thousands of angry right-wing protesters—objecting to the joint session of Congress to verify the results of the election—charged Capitol Police outside of the Capitol, forcing their way past barriers and into the building. Congress was evacuated as the mob tore through the building, ransacking offices, damaging and stealing property, and . Hours later, once the situation was finally under control, the joint session was reopened. However, within minutes, Republican lawmakers set into motion a false narrative of the day's events in an attempt to obfuscate the truth and rewrite history.The Capitol Police—whose unpreparedness, at best, paved the way for the mob's takeover of the Congressional building—were praised for their heroism by Vice President Mike Pence in his remarks reopening the session and pledging a bipartisan commitment to getting back to work. Rep. Steve Scalise, whose affinity for the extreme right is well-documented—he as "David Duke without the baggage"—called for calm. Speeches and remarks from Mitch McConnell, , and Lindsey Graham decrying the violence were held up in news reports and Twitter posts from reporters about the breach of the Capitol. Other members of the GOP Senate delegation have been outspoken in the days since the riot in their calls for calm and performative shock over the unrest. Conservatives have also that blames the left for the violence, absolving their supporters and movement of its responsibility for the attack. A shared on the House floor by Rep. Matt Gaetz on Wednesday evening — blaming the assault on the Capitol on the left — received standing ovations from the GOP side of the House chamber. The intent behind this reframing of reality is clear. An honest accounting of what happened on Wednesday would lay the blame for what happened where it belongs—at the feet of the American right. Any such accounting would indict the Republican Party and its allies in conservative media for decades nurturing the conditions within their base that led to this latest escalation in right-wing violence. It also allows the over 121 GOP House members and over six Senators who nonetheless voted to overturn the results of the election after the riot to skate by without consequence. A not so distant pastRepublicans continue to back away from the chaos they've spent decades laying the groundwork for and have in recent months encouraged more and more explicitly. McConnell and Graham Trump's agenda and behavior largely without fail from the beginning. Romney, now a vocal opponent of the president, sought out Trump's in 2012 and to be Secretary of State in 2016.An hour after the Senate was evacuated and the mob of insurrectionists tore through the Capitol, Sen. Ted Cruz's office sent out a fundraising appeal bragging about his "leading the fight to reject electors from key states." Called out about the text by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cruz indignantly replied it was automated. Cruz is on the defense for his attempts to wriggle out of responsibility, but he's increasingly being made a scapegoat (unsurprising given his unpopularity in the chamber). Sen. Tom Cotton, who is angling to claim Trump's crown, , and used the opportunity to attack Cruz and also Hawley, another potential 2024 opponent."Some senators, for political advantage, were giving false hope to their supporters," said Cotton.But Cotton himself fed into the lie that there was widespread voter fraud, in the aftermath of the election that "legal voters" would decide the election and urging supporters to back Trump's legal defense fund. Sen. Marco Rubio on Friday Americans that he was outraged by the riot—though he took time to call out "left hypocrites'' for not objecting to civil rights demonstrations over the summer. The comments came just two months after Rubio that attempted to run a Biden-Harris bus off the road in a brazen, daytime attack on a Texas highway, telling rally goers in Florida, "All the cars on the road, we love what they did." The impulse to put the genie back in the bottle may be understandable now that the violence has finally landed at their doors. But for the same people who spent months upping the ante of incitement to their followers on the right to now, when it's most politically convenient, have a change of heart is in service of one thing only: ensuring that the living historical narrative around the events is reshaped in a light that absolves them and the movement they're a part of from any responsibility.Institutional rewriteLiberal figures and institutions are hardly immune to the impulse to reframe the events in the most positive light possible for institutions, even when doing so isn't in service of material reality. MSNBC, continuing its march toward becoming a clearinghouse for retorted national security figures and the worldview they bring with them, couldn't help itself and had a contributor turn the storming of the Capitol into a Russian conspiracy. Ben Rhodes, former deputy national security advisor to President Barack Obama, that the real winner of the chaos was, , Russian President Vladimir Putin, the go-to villain for the Democratic Party. Another former Obama foreign policy hand, Michael McFaul, alternatively suggested the mob was —an assertion made all the more incoherent by the anti-communism signs held by the insurrectionists—and that the chaos was Trump's House Speaker Nancy Pelosi echoed those words as she to Moscow, saying that Trump, a "complete tool of Putin," had given the Russian leader a "gift."But even those attempts to draw attention away from the actual perpetrators were half-hearted and short-lived. The liberal establishment by and large understands at least the political opportunity presented by the president's collapse in the public eye over the last few days—if not the need to hold accountable those who enabled the disaster in order to preserve the country's institutions. Truth, but hold the reconciliationIn order for there to be any semblance of accountability and to avoid an ever-escalating assault on the country's government by right-wing elements that seek to overthrow it and install a dictatorial regime, those who encouraged the mob and incited violence cannot avoid blame and consequence. What form that accountability takes is up for debate—expulsion from Congress has been suggested by some members, as well as censure, and there are active discussions about impeaching the president or somehow forcing his removal before January 20. The prospect of impeachment and removal is real enough that Graham has already come out and tried to portray such an action as doing "more harm than good" and that it is time to "heal the nation"—language that was used earlier in the week before the riot by Rep. Hakeem Jeffries to pour cold water on any consequences for the outgoing administration after Inauguration Day. What's not debatable is that the story of what happened and how those who incited it need to be held to account. On Wednesday, a mob inspired by the president and years of institutional Republican Party support brought to a halt the certification of a democratic election. That this reality is now being rewritten by the people who brought us to this point and supported by media and political institutions in service of maintaining their mainstream credibility is a disaster that will ensure that this isn't the last time the democratic process is attacked—and make the next attack's success more likely.Eoin Higgins is a journalist in New England. His work has also appeared in the Washington Post, The Intercept, Vice News, and many other outlets. You can find him on  and . Read the original article on . Copyright 2021.NewsletterSign up for a daily selection of our best stories — based on your reading preferences.Something is loading.It indicates an expandable section or menu, or sometimes previous / next navigation options.Two crossed lines that form an 'X'. 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The words "Business Insider".Two crossed lines that form an 'X'. It indicates a way to close an interaction, or dismiss a notification.The on January 6 by a far-right, Trump-supporting mob was the kind of scene that observers of the modern American conservative movement have long feared was a possibility. Inspired by by the president and members of Congress like Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, thousands of angry right-wing protesters—objecting to the joint session of Congress to verify the results of the election—charged Capitol Police outside of the Capitol, forcing their way past barriers...

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Eoin Higgins is senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams. Follow him on Twitter: @EoinHiggins_

https://www.commondreams.org/author/eoin-higgins-staff-writer

Eoin Higgins

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Don't let the GOP off the hook: Republican leaders are responsible for the Capitol riot

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