Pelosi says independent commission will examine Capitol riot

House Loudspeaker Nancy Pelosi said Mon that Congress might establish an unbiased, Sept 11-style commission to check out the deadly insurrection that took place at the U.S. Capitol.

Pelosi said the commission might “investigate and statement on the reality and causes associated with the January 6, 2021, domestic terrorist attack upon the United States Capitol Complex … and associated with the interference with the peaceful transfer of power."

In a letter to Democratic colleagues, Pelosi explained the House may also put forth supplemental spending to improve reliability at the Capitol.

After former President Donald Trump’s acquittal at his second Senate impeachment trial, bipartisan support appeared to be growing for an unbiased commission to examine the deadly insurrection.

Investigations in to the riot were already planned, with Senate hearings scheduled later this month found in the Senate Guidelines Committee. Pelosi, D-Calif, asked retired Army Lt Gen Russel Honoré to lead an immediate review of the Capitol’s security method.

In her letter Monday, Pelosi said, “It is clear from his results and from the impeachment trial that people must get to the reality of how this happened.”

She added, “While we plan the Commission, additionally it is clear from General Honoré’s interim reporting that people must help with a supplemental appropriation to supply for the safety of Associates and the security of the Capitol.”

Lawmakers from both parties, speaking on Sunday's information shows, signaled that a lot more inquiries were likely. The Senate verdict Saturday, using its 57-43 bulk falling 10 votes brief of the two-thirds had a need to convict Trump, hardly put to rest the debate about the Republican ex - president’s culpability for the Jan. 6 assault.

“There must be a complete investigation about what happened,” said Louisiana Sen Bill Cassidy, among seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump. “What was known, who knew it and when they understood, all that, because that builds the basis so this never happens again.”

Cassidy said he was first “attempting to hold President Trump accountable,” and added that as Us citizens hear all of the facts, “more people will proceed to where I was first.” He was censured by his state’s party after the vote.

An independent commission along the lines of the one that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks may possibly require legislation to create. That could elevate the investigation a step higher, supplying a definitive government-supported accounting of events. Even now, such a panel would pose risks of sharpening partisan divisions or overshadowing President Joe Biden's legislative agenda.

“There’s still more data that the American persons want and deserve to listen to and a good 9/11 commission is a way to help to make sure that people secure the Capitol in the years ahead,” said Sen Chris Coons, D-Del, a good Biden ally. “And that people lay bare the record of precisely how sensible and how abjectly violating of his constitutional oath President Trump really was.”

House prosecutors who argued for Trump's conviction of inciting the riot said Sunday that they had proved their case. They also railed against the Senate’s Republican innovator, Mitch McConnell, and other people who they said were “trying to have it both ways” in finding the ex - president not liable but criticizing him simultaneously.

A close Trump ally, Sen Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., voted for acquittal but acknowledged that Trump possessed some culpability for the siege at the Capitol that killed five people, including a officer, and disrupted lawmakers’ recognition of Biden’s White House victory. Graham said he looked onward to campaigning with Trump in the 2022 election, when Republicans desire to regain the congressional majority.

“His behavior following the election was outrageous,” Graham said. “We need a 9/11 commission to find out what occurred and make certain it never happens again.”

The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of “incitement of insurrection” after House prosecutors laid out a case that he was an “inciter in chief” who unleashed a mob by stoking a monthslong campaign of spreading debunked conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Trump’s legal professionals countered that Trump’s phrases were not designed to incite the violence and that impeachment was nothing but a “witch hunt” designed to prevent him from serving in office again.

The conviction tally was the most bipartisan in American history but still left Trump to declare victory and signal a political revival while a bitterly divided GOP bickered over its direction and his place in the party.

The Republicans who joined Cassidy in voting to convict were Sens Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

“It’s frustrating, however the founders knew what they were doing therefore we live with the machine that we possess,” Democratic Del Stacey Plaskett, a House prosecutor who represents the Virgin Islands, said of the verdict, describing it just as “heartbreaking.” She added: “But, listen, we didn’t need more witnesses. We wanted extra senators with spines.”

McConnell told Republican senators shortly prior to the vote that he would vote to acquit Trump. In a blistering speech following the vote, the Kentucky Republican explained the president was “practically and morally responsible for provoking the occasions of this day" but that the Senate's hands had been tied to do anything about any of it because Trump was out of workplace. The Senate, within an earlier vote, had considered the trial constitutional.

“It was powerful to hear the 57 guilties and it was puzzling to listen to and find Mitch McConnell stand and say ‘not guilty’ and, minutes later, stand once again and say he was guilty of everything,” said Rep Madeleine Dean, D-Pa. “History will understand that assertion of speaking out of two sides of his mouth,” she said.

Dean also backed the idea of a great impartial investigative commission "not guided by politics but filled up with people who would stand up to the courage of their conviction.”

Cassidy and Dean spoke on ABC's “This Week,” Graham appeared on “Fox News Sunday,” and Plaskett appeared on CNN's “State of the Union.”