Trial Video Shows Mob Threatening Vice President Pence
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
(Worthy News) – Former President Donald J. Trump’s impeachment trial continued Wednesday with prosecutors playing chilling security video of rioters searching the U.S. Capitol for the Vice President, chanting: “Hang Mike Pence!”
Footage of the January 6 deadly siege of the building that houses the bicameral U.S. Congress showed a mob claiming to be Trump supporters smashing windows and doors.
The mob entering the Capitol was furious that Pence “had done his patriotic duty” by verifying election results that showed Joe Biden had won the presidential vote, the Senate was told.
As they searched for Pence and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, overwhelmed police begged on their radios for help. In a video seen by Worthy News, Pence and family members are whisked away by security. Elsewhere lawmakers were in several close calls.
In one instance, police officer Eugene Goodman directed Republican senator Mitt Romney away from the attackers, potentially saving the lawmaker’s life.
Another video showed rioters running up and down the building hallways looking for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, calling out a mocking voice, “Naaaaancy. Oh, Naaaaancy.”
POLICE SHOOTING
Pelosi was evacuated from the complex before the mob prowls her suite of offices, her staff hiding quietly behind closed doors.
At one dramatic moment, the video shows police shooting into the crowd through a broken window, killing a San Diego woman, Ashli Babbitt. In another, a police officer is seen being crushed by the mob.
Police overwhelmed by the rioters frantically announce “we lost the line” and urge officers to safety. One officer later died.
Some senators acknowledged it was the first time they had grasped how perilously close the country came to serious danger. “When you see all the pieces come together, just the total awareness of that, the enormity of this threat, not just to us as people, as lawmakers, but the threat to the institution and what Congress represents, it’s disturbing,” said Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. “Greatly disturbing.”
Trump is the first president to face an impeachment trial after leaving office and the first to be twice impeached. He is charged with incitement of insurrection through fiery words his defense lawyers say are protected by the Constitution’s First Amendment and just figures of speech.
Prosecutors claimed Wednesday their evidence showed how close the country came to a potential breakdown in its seat of democracy as Congress was certifying Trump’s election defeat to Democrat Biden. “They did it because Donald Trump sent them on this mission,” said House prosecutor Stacey Plaskett, the Democratic delegate representing the U.S. Virgin Islands. “His mob broke into the Capitol to hunt them down.”
TRUMP FLAGS
Democratic prosecutors pointed to several attackers wearing or carrying Trump flags. “This attack would never have happened but for Donald Trump,” said prosecutor Madeleine Dean. “And so they came, draped in Trump’s flag, and used our flag, the American flag, to batter and to bludgeon.”
The impeachment managers also showed the rioters referencing Trump’s tweet criticizing Mike Pence. “On 6 January, Donald Trump did not once condemn this attack. He did not once condemn the attackers. In fact, on 6 January, the only person he condemned was his vice-president, Mike Pence, who was hiding in this building, with his family, in fear for his life,” added David Cicilline, one of the impeachment managers.
Prosecutors claimed the footage showed just how close the country came to a potential breakdown in its seat of democracy as Congress was certifying Trump’s election defeat. “They did it because Donald Trump sent them on this mission,” stressed House prosecutor Stacey Plaskett, a Democratic delegate representing the U.S. Virgin Islands. “His mob broke into the Capitol to hunt them down.”
House Democrats on Wednesday laid the blame for the attack on the US Capitol squarely on former President Trump. However, Trump, then president, condemned the violence calling it “a heinous attack” on the republic, adding that he expected those involved to be prosecuted.
“The demonstrators who infiltrated the Capitol have defiled the seat of American democracy,”
he said a day after the siege killed five people. “To those who engaged in the acts of violence and destruction, you do not represent our country. And to those who broke the law, you will pay.”
But prosecutors were not impressed with these words. “Trump knew very well what would happen when he took to the microphone at the outdoor White House rally that day as Congress gathered to certify Biden’s win,” said Democratic Representative Joe Neguse,
another impeachment manager. “This was not just a speech,” he said.
CHIEF INCITER?
The presentation Wednesday opened the first full day of arguments in the trial as prosecutors argued Trump was no “innocent bystander” but rather the “inciter in chief.”
They suggested that the deadly Capitol riot happened under a president who spent months spreading “election lies” and building a mob of supporters to stop Biden’s victory.
However, police investigators and prosecutors have also identified several attackers linked to leftist groups and movements, including Antifa, Worthy News reported earlier.
Though most Senate jurors have already made up their minds on acquittal or conviction, they were riveted and sat silently, reporters noted.
The day’s proceedings unfolded after Tuesday’s emotional start that left the former president fuming when his attorneys delivered a meandering defense. They failed to halt the trial on constitutional grounds.
Some allies reportedly called for yet another shakeup to his legal team. Security remained extremely tight Wednesday at the Capitol, fenced off and patrolled by thousands of National Guard troops.
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