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WHAT WE KNOW AND WHAT WE DON’T ABOUT JANUARY 6

Friday, March 7, 2025
John Daniel Davidson| Imprimis

Just hours after his inauguration on January 20, President Trump pardoned more than 1,500 people convicted of offenses related to the events of January 6, 2021. He commuted the sentences of fourteen additional people whose cases for a full pardon are still under review.

Earlier that morning, to less fanfare, President Biden had issued “preemptive pardons”—a type of presidential pardon with no historical precedent— to all the members and staff of the House Select Committee on January 6 and to all the U.S. Capitol and D.C. Metropolitan police officers who testified before that committee.

What could better illustrate that what happened at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 has become a political Rorschach test on which Americans remain deeply divided?

Partisans on the Left accept the official narrative of the Democrats and the corporate press, believing that January 6 amounted to an insurrection and a violent attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Partisans on the Right believe that however bad the events of that day were, the federal government’s reaction has been even worse, amounting to a weaponization of the Department of Justice to criminalize certain political views.

Many ordinary Americans are left wondering what to believe. With those Americans in mind, it is helpful to sift through what we have learned about January 6 over the past four years—and to note the things that we still don’t know.

The official report of the House Select Committee, which runs to more than 800 pages, is too deeply biased to give much help. This was foreordained given the hyper-partisan way the Select Committee was formed. Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s two Republican appointments to the committee—Representatives Jim Jordan and Jim Banks—and instead appointed two virulently anti-Trump Republicans, Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger.

The Select Committee’s report, issued in December 2022, omitted important information about January 6 and failed to address many lingering questions about the government’s role and response. Its partisan (and specifically anti-Trump) purpose can be deduced from its recommendations: that the Department of Justice pursue criminal charges against Trump and that Congress bar Trump from ever again holding federal office.

In some instances, the Select Committee showed a blatant disregard for facts. It claimed, for example, that Trump was aware of violence at the Capitol for more than three hours—187 minutes, to be exact—before he took action to intervene. Cheney referred to this as a “supreme dereliction of duty.” But in fact, according to a timeline of events compiled by The New York Times (and corroborated by The Washington Post), no more than 25 minutes passed between the reported breach of the Capitol at 2:13 p.m. and Trump’s first tweet addressing the situation at 2:38 p.m., when he wrote, “Please support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement. They are truly on the side of our Country. Stay peaceful!” About 30 minutes later, Trump again took to Twitter to address the demonstrators: “I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order—respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!”

More important than the report’s factual errors are the serious questions never investigated by the Select Committee. Why did Democrat congressional leaders turn down repeated offers of National Guard troops to protect the Capitol that day? Why was security so lax outside the Capitol despite expectations of a large demonstration? How many FBI informants and other undercover federal law enforcement officials were in the crowd? What communication did the FBI or FBI informants have with protest organizers ahead of the event? Why wasn’t then-Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund told there were federal informants in the crowd? Why did the U.S. Capitol Police open the doors and allow demonstrators into the building? Why did federal law enforcement authorities demand cell phone location data for the thousands of people who were outside the Capitol but broke no laws? Why does the FBI still have no idea who planted the pipe bombs near the headquarters of the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee on the evening of January 5?

Defenders of the official narrative accuse those who ask such questions of being conspiracists. But until those questions are answered, our understanding of January 6—no matter our political leanings—will be incomplete.

Here is what we know happened. On the morning of January 6, 2021, tens of thousands of Trump supporters gathered for a rally on The Ellipse, a park south of the White House, to show support for the President and protest what they believed were irregularities and election fraud that marred the 2020 election. Trump addressed the crowd and then encouraged them to march to the U.S. Capitol to protest “peacefully and patriotically.” Trump never incited the audience or suggested anything other than peaceful demonstrations. Indeed, many of those present at The Ellipse had applied for and been issued permits by the Capitol Police to stage events and host speakers on the U.S. Capitol grounds that day—a common enough occurrence in Washington, D.C.

Before Trump had even finished speaking, a separate and much smaller group had already gathered at the Capitol and breached the first set of outdoor barriers. As the main body of peaceful demonstrators made their way from The Ellipse to the U.S. Capitol grounds, confrontations between this smaller group and Capitol Police were already underway, and eventually a riot ensued. The demonstrators marching toward the Capitol had no way of knowing what was underway while they were still at The Ellipse watching Trump speak. And owing to the size of the Capitol grounds—some 23 acres—it was unclear to many, even upon arriving at the Capitol, what was happening.

Much of what we have learned about this is from more than 40,000 hours of security footage that had been kept under seal by House Democrat leadership and excluded from the Select Committee’s inquiry. This security video was released to Tucker Carlson by Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy after Republicans took over the majority in the House in the 2022 midterms. Among other things, it shows clearly that after the chaos had subsided, U.S. Capitol Police were ushering people into the building. One must presume that many of those who entered the Capitol during this period were unaware of the earlier clashes with police and assumed—because police were waving demonstrators along and, in some cases, even escorting them—that they were allowed to be there.

The video released by McCarthy included footage of Jacob Chansley, the “QAnon Shaman” who became the face of the “insurrection” in the media and who was sentenced, in the fall of 2021, to 41 months in federal prison. As many as nine police officers calmly escorted Chansley around the Capitol complex, at several points even checking for unlocked doors for him. They did not try to hinder, let alone apprehend him. It also included footage showing Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who died on January 7, 2021, walking around and apparently healthy on January 6. A month after his death, the Washington, D.C. medical examiner issued a report concluding that Sicknick died of natural causes. To this day, Democrats and the corporate press cite Sicknick’s death as evidence of their narrative, claiming he died due to blunt force trauma to the head with a fire extinguisher. The security footage withheld by the Select Committee clearly indicates that this never happened.

The video also raised questions about who was responsible for failing to provide adequate police protection for the Capitol. That such a relatively small group of rioters managed to breach the Capitol is an indictment of those responsible for providing for its security—namely, Speaker Pelosi and Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser.

Barred from participating in the Select Committee, House Republicans conducted their own probe and released a 140-page report in December 2022. It blamed “leadership and law enforcement failures” for making the Capitol vulnerable and accused former House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving of being “compromised by politics,” coordinating with Pelosi and her staff while leaving Republican lawmakers out of security discussions and planning. The report also claimed that Democratic leaders were concerned about the “optics” of deploying the National Guard in response to the riot in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter riots during the summer of 2020.

Perhaps most puzzling of all was the Capitol Police Board’s failure to request National Guard assistance prior to January 6, which, according to a separate bipartisan Senate report, meant that “the District of Columbia National Guard was not activated, staged, and prepared to quickly respond to an attack on the Capitol.” This failure stands out in part because Trump himself, in the days leading up to January 6, was adamant that 10,000 National Guard troops be deployed ahead of that day—a fact Cheney concealed by hiding an interview transcript produced by the Select Committee. Trump’s request for troops was not only ignored by Pelosi and Bowser, it was also met with resistance at the Pentagon, which delayed the deployment of the National Guard and then covered it up.

The House Republican report also found that police officers were “under-trained and ill-equipped to protect the Capitol complex. One officer testified to investigators that he went into the fight . . . with nothing but his USCP-issued baseball cap. Even if every USCP officer had been at work that day, their numbers would still have been insufficient to hold off the rioters due to a lack of training and equipment.”

A December 2024 report from the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) is also damning on this point. The FBI, which was responsible for canvassing the Capitol grounds for potential security threats or breaches ahead of a major demonstration like the one planned for January 6, failed to do so and gave no reason why. Then-FBI Associate Deputy Director Paul Abbate described the lack of canvassing as a “basic step that was missed” and told the OIG he would have expected a canvassing to have been conducted beforehand through what the FBI calls the issuance of an “intelligence collection product.” Such a product was issued for the January 20 inauguration, but not for January 6.

The OIG report also revealed for the first time that the FBI had 26 confidential human sources, or informants, in the crowd that day. Most of them went on their own initiative, according to the report, and three went into the U.S. Capitol—a crime for which many otherwise law-abiding January 6 defendants were sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Incredibly, one of the FBI informants who entered the Capitol was reimbursed by the FBI for his travel expenses to and from Washington. The idea that the FBI had informants at the Capitol that day was previously denounced as a conspiracy theory.

The disclosure about the 26 informants invites further questions about what other elements of federal law enforcement were present that day and what exactly they were doing. The video released by McCarthy shows that Ray Epps, a man who is suspected of being an FBI informant and who was at the heart of the events of January 6, lied to Congress about his movements. When the Select Committee had him testify in an attempt to clear his name after footage emerged of him urging the crowd to storm the Capitol, Epps told committee members that he never entered the Capitol. He testified that when he texted his nephew at 2:12 p.m. that day, writing that he had “orchestrated the protests at the Capitol,” he was already back at his hotel room. But surveillance footage shows this is not true. Epps remained at the Capitol for half an hour after he sent that text. Members of the committee knew this but never followed up.

The mystery surrounding Epps is in some ways representative of everything we still don’t know about January 6. And to be clear, the reason we do not know is that efforts to get to the truth have been actively thwarted. Until that changes—until we know all the basic facts about that day—Americans will have no reason to be confident that justice has been served.

COMMISSIONER DISCUSSION MARCH 3, 2024, BETWEEN COMMISSIONER BRAKEY AND COMMISSIONER SPIDALIERI ON THE MERITS OF CONTINUED COUNTY FINANCIAL SUPPORT OF THE MIDDLEFIELD AIRPORT

Wednesday, March 5, 2025

After a routine approval on Tuesday, March 4, 2025, of ten agenda items whose presenters identified themselves before reading their requests in the absence of Commissioner Ralph Spidalieri, Commissioners Carolyn Brakey and Jim Dvorak found themselves faced with Agenda Item #11 requesting payment of $799,702.55 to Infinity Construction for unplanned additional expenses for the Geauga County Courthouse Expansion, already over the $20 million original price. In the absence of Commissioner Spidalieri, an incumbent serving his fourth term, Commissioner Brakey expressed alarm at “huge bills.”

She further inquired, “Who’s looking out for the county?” The response from Acting County Administrator Linda Burhenne was that Jarrett and Brandon of Owner’s Representative NP5 (Paid for by the Geauga County Commissioners) are available on Thursdays by the Construction Trailer. At this point Commissioner Dvorak corrected Ms. Burhenne, providing the appointed time of the weekly walk-through of the Courthouse renovation in progress as 1pm on Tuesdays. Mrs. Brakey enthusiastically signaled her willingness to learn more about the huge unplanned construction add-ons at the Courthouse and the need to be cautious about superfluous add-ons from Court IT, expensive countertops, and a roll of electrical tape invoiced at $22.95. “We’re the people who gotta say no to expanded costs at the courthouse project. I don’t have enough info on this issue. What else is in this change order that isn’t looking out for us?”

Then after two Executive Sessions that lasted approximately 50 minutes, attendees learned that with Mr. Spidalieri’s reappearance to public session, formal negotiations for purchase of public property was now authorized, to be handled by Spidalieri and Burhenne. No further information was presented to the public.

Although all of this detail occurred in the first half of the meeting, the validity of the county’s financial support of the county airport took up the entire second half of the meeting, some forty minutes, until the meeting adjourned at 11:20 am. Although Mr. Spidalieri in a very rambling, emotional speech claimed that he hoped Commissioner Dvorak would provide the second approval vote to provide the airport with $1.33 million dollars for an approximate $500,999 return, Mr. Dvorak remained quietly listening. Spidalieri used the argument that there were promising Department of Transportation studies which could be construed to provide a favorable outlook for the airport, expressed remorse that the County had failed the airport in the past, claimed that CFO’s came to the that airport to conduct their business, and noted how valuable it was for all the fledgling people interested in aeronautics. According to public records, Mr. Spidalieri is/has been a helicopter owner for quite some time but did not mention that detail until questioned about it by this writer, when she followed correct protocol, raised her hand, and waited to be recognized by Commissioner Dvorak.

Commissioner Brakey came prepared, explaining her meeting with the Airport Board, during which she asked for five-year business plans and received none. The testimony she received from Airport Board Members was that the hangars are in severe disrepair. Additionally, testimony from airport individuals she talked to was that if they raised hangar rent to current market conditions, they would lose clientele, an indication that the county airport is a hobbyist venture, not a genuine business venture. In addition, the Department of Transportation reports, which she had read and analyzed before coming to this session, “are not persuasive.” Neither are the emotional statements she has heard because they lack documentation. “Show me the numbers,” she added. Mr. Spidalieri was unable during his lengthy, rambling discourse to provide any financial documentation, instead claiming that he had no personal stake or any reason whatsoever to benefit from his intense involvement in the airport. She also contested the ability to make the runway fit to receive commercial aircraft: “if they can’t expand the runway (because of current impediments), they can’t get their aircraft in.”

Mrs. Brakey revisited her spoken concerns of several weeks ago: The individuals and entities who benefit from the airport and/or its expansion, should be responsible for its financial upkeep. In fact, the written agreement cites the responsibility of the airport authority to maintain and not continue to be “an irresponsible use of Geauga County taxpayer funds.” She additionally noted that during this period of Geauga County real estate collection, taxpayers are having a particularly difficult time.

When asked by another citizen what she knew about airplanes, Mrs. Brakey replied that entertaining thoughts of flying was way out of her pay scale. Later during public comment session, without waiting to raise his hand, identify himself, or state his name, the same individual shouted out that the County Prosecutor bore responsibility for the current problem with the airport. Everyone else during the meeting was respectful enough to follow meeting protocol: “Those wishing to make a comment or ask a question, please raise their hand to be called upon, begin by stating their name and address…”

So much for the touted County Protocol regarding public comment, folks.

WHY ARE EGG PRICES SURGING? IT'S NOT JUST THE BIRDS

You've noticed the news about a bird flu health crisis — sick birds, egg shortages, price hikes. The empty shelves, constant updates and confusing directives likely stir up memories of COVID. But there's a reason why bird flu, or H5N1, feels like a repeat performance. For starters, officials have been warning about a coming bird flu pandemic for years, but every instance of fearmongering about a lethal bird flu has turned out to be false.

That's why I wrote "The Great Bird Flu Hoax" in 2009. Now, bird flu is making headlines again as outbreaks occur in birds, other animals and even humans across the U.S. If it seems like déjà vu, you're not imagining it; it's deliberate. Dr. Clayton Baker, an internal medicine physician and author with the Brownstone Institute, cuts through the noise: "Bird flu is a complete rerun of the COVID script," only now it's your food supply, not your freedom, under siege.¹

Clayton explains:²

Video Link

What exactly is bird flu? H5N1 is a virus that typically affects birds such as chickens and ducks. The World Health Organization explains it's been present in wild bird populations for decades, sometimes crossing over to farm animals or, in rare cases, humans.³ The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that since 2022, more than 150 million birds have been killed due to H5N1, with 41.4 million culled between December 2024 and January 2025 alone.^4,5

Authorities are testing flocks extensively, eliminating entire groups if even one bird tests positive. The ramifications extend far beyond the barnyard to your everyday routine. With tens of millions of chickens lost, eggs and poultry have become scarcer and costlier. Egg prices are expected to increase 20.3% in 2025⁶ and reached a 45-year peak in January.⁷

Further, vaccines are likely to be introduced into your food supply, altering what you consume without your consent. For instance, the USDA granted a conditional license to pharmaceutical company Zoetis for its bird flu vaccine, labeled for use in chickens.⁸ According to Baker, the CEO of Zoetis, formerly a subsidiary of Pfizer, has "close ties to Pfizer, BlackRock, and the Gates Foundation, all well-established bad actors during the COVID era."

Further, many aren't aware that in 2012, scientists genetically modified the wild H5N1 virus in a lab to create a pandemic strain that could spread through the air, raising concerns about unintended releases and lab leaks, a risk that feels all too familiar in the post-COVID era.⁹

Recall the COVID pandemic for a moment. You likely remember scientists altering a virus in a lab, its subsequent escape and the sudden restrictions that kept you on lockdown awaiting a shot. As Baker notes, COVID's SARS-CoV-2 emerged from lab manipulation under the guise of pandemic preparedness, leaking in 2019, and bird flu is tracing a parallel path.

A 2012 report in The Guardian details similar experiments with H5N1, including how scientists manipulated the virus to become airborne and able to spread via droplets from coughs or sneezes.¹⁰

Today, they're applying the same tactic to poultry, relying on misleading PCR tests as they ramp up testing for bird flu. They're testing not only birds but also milk and farmers relentlessly, stacking up misleading positive results to sustain the tension. Baker explains that this isn't conspiracy theory — it's pattern recognition.¹¹

Eliminating over 150 million birds doesn't halt the H5N1 virus — it reduces your food availability. Yet, the USDA has invested $1.25 billion in indemnity and compensation payments to farmers affected by bird flu since 2022.¹² This means your tax dollars are directly funding a strategy that isn't working.

In fact, it's making things worse. As Nicolas Hulscher, an epidemiologist with the University of Michigan School of Public Health, points out, this massive expenditure not only incentivizes farmers to comply with the mass killing of their animals but also represents a serious misuse of taxpayer money, triggering a cascade of severe downstream consequences.¹³

One of the most immediate consequences you're experiencing is the skyrocketing price of eggs. This makes a basic food staple less affordable for everyone. Further, Hulscher highlights a disturbing connection between mass culling and chicken-to-human transmission of H5N1. A study published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that 100% of poultry-linked human H5N1 cases were traced back to these depopulation efforts.¹⁴

So, the very actions intended to "protect" public health are increasing the risk of human infection. Perhaps most concerning is the fact that mass culling isn't even necessary. Hulscher cites three separate studies demonstrating that chickens can survive H5N1 infection and develop natural immunity. This natural immunity then helps to limit future spread of the virus. This evidence suggests a far more effective and less costly approach than the current mass slaughter.

Bird flu shots are now front and center. In addition to the USDA's conditional license for Zoetis' bird flu vaccine for chickens, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services agreed to give Moderna $590 million to develop an mRNA vaccine for H5N1 in humans — even though the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said bird flu is a low risk to people.¹⁵

Dr. Robert Malone draws parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic response, particularly regarding the use of mRNA technology:¹⁶

"No evidence exists that any influenza vaccine will provide anything even close to sterilizing immunity (complete protection from infection, replication, and spread). In other words, what we can reliably predict is that the Moderna product that you are paying for will provide yet another leaky influenza vaccine with the added risks associated with current mRNA vaccine technology."

The first step to break free from this destructive cycle is understanding that it exists. From there, urge officials to stop mass flock culls. "It traumatizes farmers, wastes resources, creates food shortages, is inhumane in the extreme to animals, and does nothing to stop the virus. Let the flocks develop natural immunity," Baker says.¹⁷

While cleaning house, Baker calls for investigations into the USDA Southeast Poultry Research Lab in Athens, Georgia, and the Kawaoka Bird Flu Lab at the University of Wisconsin, which are involved in gain-of-function research on H5N1. Multiple accidents involving H5N1 have been reported at the University of Wisconsin lab over the years.¹⁸ Meanwhile, oppose hasty shot rollouts.

The lesson from COVID is clear: unquestioning compliance with top-down directives leads to predictable and detrimental outcomes. It's time to demand transparency, challenge the prevailing narrative, advocate for evidence-based solutions like natural immunity and, ultimately, refuse to let history, or rather, the playbook, repeat itself.

1, 2, 11, 17 Brownstone Institute February 18, 2025