'Did not happen': GOP release of new Jan. 6 footage blows up their 'biggest lie': reporter
Yet another false claim by Trump supporters in defense of the January 6 rioters has been blown to pieces after House Republicans released their latest batch of footage of the attack on the U.S. Capitol, according to longtime congressional reporter Jamie Dupree.
Specifically, Dupree wrote, the footage puts the lie to the assertion that police at the Capitol stood by and opened the doors to let the rioters in — a claim that is often used as evidence that the whole event was somehow an entrapment operation to trick Trump supporters into committing acts of violence.
"Courtesy of House Republicans, I went to watch 3 more hours of Jan. 6 security tapes from the Capitol today," wrote Dupree in a post on X. "The tapes show the biggest lie about Jan. 6 is that the cops 'opened the doors' to let Trump supporters in. That did not happen."
The footage in Dupree's post showed police trying to hold the line and prevent the mob from bursting in through several doors at the Capitol, often being overpowered by a flood of people rushing them. At no point in the footage did police stand aside or open doors to allow people in.
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Ever since the Capitol attack, which led to widespread injuries among officers, millions of dollars in damage throughout the building, and jeopardized the safety of members of Congress certifying the electoral count, defenders of the participants have pushed a number of false claims, including that none of them were armed — which was swiftly debunked as several were arrested on various weapons charges.
In recent months, House Republicans have released thousands of hours of raw security footage of the January 6 attack. This marks a reversal from a previous assertion by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) that the footage couldn't be released unaltered because those who participated in the attack could be "retaliated against," which led to widespread outrage.