WASHINGTON — House members hoping for insight and accountability for the January 6 insurrection during a hearing with acting U.S. Capitol Police Chief Yogananda Pittman instead got, in the words of one committee member, “finger pointing and, it looks like, protecting jobs.”
The hearing Thursday morning was Pittman’s first public testimony since being named acting chief following the resignation of former USCP Chief Steven Sund in the wake of the Capitol riot. Virginia Rep. Jennifer Wexton (D) chided her for the department’s silence since January 6, pointing out that Capitol Police have held no public briefings since the Capitol riot.
Wexton said that “kind of news vacuum” creates an environment where conspiracy theories and misinformation can easily spread. But Pittman made it clear she felt no pressing responsibility to release information to the public.
“It’s been almost two months,” Wexton said. “Will you commit to having public press briefings in the future going forward?”
“No ma’am, not at this time,” Pittman replied.
Pittman’s own testimony during the hearing shows how “notoriously opaque” – as Wexton described it – the department can be. In response to questions from the committee about when fencing around the Capitol can come down, Pittman revealed an unreported-until-then threat against the State of the Union.
“We know that members of the militia groups that were present on January 6 have stated their desires that they want to blow up the Capitol and kill as many members as possible with a direct nexus to the State of the Union – which, we know, that date has not been identified,” Pittman said. “So based on that information, we think that it’s prudent that Capitol Police maintain its enhanced and robust security posture until we address those vulnerabilities.”
A failure to communicate turned out to be a consistent theme throughout the hearing. Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), referencing testimony from former Chief Sund on Tuesday, asked Pittman how it could be that an FBI report talking about “blood being spilled” and potential insurrectionists sharing maps of the Capitol tunnels and facilities could have been missed?
Pittman echoed Sund, saying the report was raw intelligence that didn’t rise to the level of actionability. She also rejected the possibility, posed by Clark, that institutional biases and/or white supremacy led to the department downplaying the possibility for violence on January 6.
“As the first Black and female chief of this department I take any allegation of inequitable policing very seriously,” Pittman said. “I have no evidence whatsoever that suggests there was any discrepancy based on our security posture as it relates to making enhancements or not based upon race.”
Ranking committee member Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) gave Pittman the most sustained grilling about what she described as the “chaos” she witnessed firsthand inside the Capitol on January 6.
“I was standing next to officers, both sergeants-at-arms and Capitol Police, as the insurrection was happening. It was very clear that their head pieces, their communication pieces, they were getting no actual, real communication,” Beutler said. “They were getting no leadership. They were getting no direction. There was no coordination. You could see the fear in their eyes. The brave men and women who were just kind of left out on their own to defend did the best they could with what they had.”
When Pittman responded by saying the incident command protocols had broken down and seeming to say that “boots-on-the-ground commanders” should have asserted control, Beutler cut her off and pointed out that her own officers recently passed a no confidence resolution against her.
“So I am frustrated that what I’m not hearing is, you know, hey, I was sitting there watching this with a bird’s eye view… I’m hearing a lot of process and almost explaining why there’s a problem versus how you’re going to make sure that there’s a command center that speaks into the earpieces of officers and provides leadership,” Beutler said. “Part of the reason there was chaos was because each and every one of these officers, boots-on-the-ground commander or not, had to make a decision with no information. There was no incoming help as far as they knew. They had no idea what you guys were doing. My hat is off to these brave men and women. They saved our lives. And I’m frustrated that I’m not hearing, ‘This is how we’re fixing that. Right now this is what we’re doing.’ And that’s what I expect.”
The hearing ended with committee chair Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) saying he and other members remained frustrated both with what happened on January 6 and the answers, or lack thereof, they’ve gotten since.
Next Wednesday, a joint session of the Senate Rules and Administration Committee and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs panel will hear testimony from officials from the Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security and the FBI. Scheduled witnesses include Jill Sanborn, assistant director of the FBI’s counterterrorism division and Melissa Smislova, acting under secretary of DHS’ Office of Intelligence and Analysis.
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