Looking back on the 2021 Capitol insurrection

The insurrection at the U.S. Capitol was one year ago. Domestic extremists overwhelmed Capitol police and attacked the building where lawmakers were formally counting the Electoral College votes for the 2020 election. We look back on what happened that day and its aftermath with two members of Oregon’s Congressional delegation: Democratic U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio and Democratic U.S. Rep. Kurt Schrader.

The following transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer.

Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. One year ago today, a pro-Trump mob breached the US Capitol and a brazen attack against US Democracy. They were trying to prevent what’s normally a formality, Congress’s certification of the results of the presidential election. They didn’t succeed in that narrow goal. Obviously Congress reconvened late at night and Vice President Mike Pence officially affirmed that Joe Biden had won the election. But it is hard to overstate the effects of January 6th on our political system and on our national psyche. We’re going to get the perspective now from two members of Oregon’s Congressional delegation. They were both in the capital on January 6. We start with Peter DeFazio who represents Oregon’s 4th District. Congressman DeFazio, thanks for making time on a somber day.

Peter DeFazio: Thanks, Dave. Yes, it is a day to reflect and look forward, too.

Miller: Well, let’s start with the reflections first. What have you been thinking about the most on this one year anniversary?

DeFazio: How close we came to losing our system of representative democracy. This was long planned. Trump first gave a speech in Pittsburgh, way back in mid-September, where in one of his long blathering speeches, he said, “You know, if they can’t count the votes, if they don’t count the votes, then it goes to the House and I win. We win because every state gets one vote, Alaska gets one vote, California gets one vote,” and the Republicans controlled 27 states. That was, I think, the genesis, or the tip of the iceberg of all the planning that was going on with his organization, in case he didn’t win the election.

Miller: So what lessons did you take from January 6th?

DeFazio: We’re in a very fragile state. If they had gotten ahold of one of those ballot boxes, they were carried out by pages to a secure location, if they’d gotten ahold of one of those ballot boxes, we would have had to go back to those states and asked them to recertify the election and they already had been working state legislators to try and get them to send alternate slates of delegates to challenge the electoral count, it’s very unlikely that we would have gotten the same results out of a number of those swing states. They also suggested to Mike Pence that he send back six states and give them a deadline of the 15th of January and if they couldn’t re-certify by the 15th of January or didn’t, then it would be thrown to the House of Representatives. They had numerous threads going on to go - one of the most vulnerable parts of our democracy. This is the counting of the electoral votes under an obsolete law in 1877, and also the fact that should there be no conclusion or tie, that no one gets enough votes, then it goes to the House of Representatives. A state with 50 million people gets one vote and a state with 800,000 people gets one vote. That would be incredible minority rule, just like the Senate.

Miller: The motivation behind the people who attacked the capitol clearly was to overturn the presidential election that they had been led to believe by people from the President down was stolen. It was a lie. And it remains a lie. It’s not true. But in poll after poll, a majority of Republicans, sometimes two-thirds of Republicans say they believe the 2020 election was stolen. What does that mean going forward? We’re not just talking about elected leaders, we’re talking about a huge swath of the Republican electorate.

DeFazio: No, that is very serious, very dangerous, and in states where they have total control, they’re attempting to pervert the process. There in Georgia, the legislature can overturn the election results and put in whatever results they want. In other states, they’re looking at substituting people who believe the election was stolen, as the people who would oversee the next election, when Trump runs again in 24, they’re going about this very methodically around the country and this is putting us in great peril. I mean, the solution would be getting some voting rights reform through the damn Senate. We’ve done it twice in the House or three times, and I guess they’re gonna try again in the Senate. If we can’t convince Sinema and Manchin that we’re looking potentially at the end of America’s Representative democracy or constitutional republic and that this is essential, we’re in deep trouble.

Miller:  In the days following the attack, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said this, “The President bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on congress by mob rioters.” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said, “There’s no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.” In other words, there was widespread Republican condemnation of the President, but now a Republican who criticizes the former president is essentially ostracized or stripped of leadership or primary. If an attempted insurrection did not shake Trump’s thrall over the Republican Party, do you think that anything could?

DeFazio: He said when he was first a candidate, he could go out in the street, I think on 7th Avenue, and shoot somebody and nothing would happen. Unfortunately with the cult following that he’s developed, made up of a whole diverse group of people, some of the most loathsome being white supremacists, Proud Boys and Oath Keepers and others, and other people who are just being brainwashed by Fox, the conservative media and these are people who also are living on the edge, they’re desperate, they’re desperate saying the government doesn’t work for me, I can’t make a living, my kids or whatever. And so they’ve become part of the cult too and those are the ones we’ve got to try and bring back.

Miller: I should note that we reached out to Oregon Republican Congressman Cliff Bentz and Washington Republican Congresswoman, Jaime Herrera Beutler. They both declined our request. I’m talking right now with Peter DeFazio, a Democratic US congressman representing Oregon’s 4th district. More than 725 people who took part in the attack have now been arrested. But I haven’t heard of any political leaders who encouraged people to come to the capital, who are facing charges. What do you think about the FBI’s investigations so far?

DeFazio: Well, the FBI has been focused on the rioters, the insurrectionists themselves. The commission headed by Bennie Thompson, a good friend of mine, is looking at the political leaders who were involved. They got quite a bit out of Mark Meadows, including an outline of different ways to overturn the election and that and the memo to Pence about sending back six states before he clammed up or lawyered up, and they have interviewed more than 300 people and they are pressing ahead. That’s where the consequences are going to come, which ultimately might even lead to charges against Trump, minimally dereliction of duty, if not something even more serious in terms of incitement or attempt to overthrow our democracy.

Miller: Did the attack last year figure in any way in your decision to not seek reelection?

DeFazio: No, I mean, I was there with my baseball bat, my bear spray and I’m a fighter. But I just, I’ve pretty much done everything that I had on my agenda. My last few big things were the harbor maintenance tax I had been fighting for, for 25 years. Service transportation, not the bill I wanted, not the 21st Century Bill, but a lot of money and I’m working with the administration to spend it better and deal more meaningfully with climate change than that bill would have done. I don’t, didn’t have many big things left on my list and in 36 years, I’m the, there are only 60 people in the history of the republic out of 14,000 something who have served 36 years and it’s a long commute and it’s a tough job and I just felt it was a good time to pass the torch and my democrats, my district is better. It’s not deep blue. It’s still going to be purplish, it’s gonna be a tough election. But I’m going to be working hard to elect a Democrat in my district.

Miller: Pass the torch and maybe pass the bear mace as well.

DeFazio: I’ll leave it with the office.

Miller: Peter DeFazio, thanks for joining us.

DeFazio: Okay, thank you.

Miller: That’s Peter DeFazio, Democratic Congressman from Oregon’s 4th congressional district. For another perspective on what happened a year ago today, we called up Kurt Schrader earlier this morning. He is a Democrat from Oregon’s 5th district. I noted that when we talked last year in the immediate aftermath of the attack, his overwhelming feeling was sadness. So I asked what he was feeling today.

Kurt Schrader: Okay, well, still sadness. I mean, it was a horrible time in our country’s history where fellow Americans invaded their own capital because they’re encouraged to do so by an ex-President of the United States. I mean, that’s just pretty surreal to me, Dave, and totally out of line with what America is all about. It’s not about this right-wing extremism or activism. It’s about thoughtful dialogue and getting things done governing and and to have someone incite violence, that goes beyond just simple activism and protest, inciting violence that the President of the United States, past president did. That’s terrible and should never happen. And I just, I’m sad. I don’t understand how Americans could be so misguided, so misled by one person that they would attack their own capital.

Miller: Do you have any answers to that question a year later or do you still truly not understand how it could have happened, how we got to this point? I mean, it’s a crucial question if we want to avoid it.

Schrader: That’s a very good point. I think you’re absolutely right. Hopefully upon some reflection, most of those folks that attacked the Capitol of the United States, now with a little better perspective, realize the heinousness of their crime and that just because someone tells you to do something, you shouldn’t necessarily do it. I mean, we’re all taught to use your own independent judgment. And frankly, as Oregonians, I’d like to think we do a better job of that than many other of our fellow countrymen where we form our own opinions, we listen hopefully to the dialogue that’s out there, both sides, and form your own opinion and realize that some of the stuff that’s out there, both on the left and the right is pretty extreme and can cannot be helpful. When I look back a little bit, I mean, what Trump did seems like the demagogues of old back in the ancient Roman and Greek times where they’d exhort the populace to all these crazy actions and make all these statements that had no basis in fact, that would appeal to the emotions of people that are concerned about their personal situation and lead them on to doing horrible things that you would not normally do. And so I think hopefully we’ve got to be aware of the fact that, all due respect, sometimes the media, sometimes different leaders will exhort us to doing things that we really, really should be thinking better of and not do in the first place. And I’m hopeful in the Congress we can get back to working together on a thoughtful basis and not forget what happened on January 6, but move forward from that, lessons learned. Democracy is fragile and don’t take it for granted.

Miller: I want to play a short excerpt from an interview that we did with you the day after the attack 364 days ago. This is part of when you were talking about the former president. Let’s have a listen.

Schrader: “The only solace I take at the end of the day is that he is a completely broken man, bereft now of his party. The more and more Republicans disavowing what he did. Every single Republican, well that I know of anyway, disavowed the acts against our sacred Capitol yesterday and many hold Donald Trump to blame. A lot of people switched their votes on the objections because of what happened yesterday. There were only, we’re gonna have, we were gonna theoretically hear objections based on six different states, but it ended up only being two as senators who were sufficiently chastened by the horrible events that their president incited and decided only to contest Arizona and Pennsylvania.”

Miller: So in other words, what you said a year ago is that the solace you took was that you saw broad Republican condemnation and repudiation of Donald Trump. That has evaporated almost almost everywhere except for a few holdouts who are themselves being repudiated by the GOP. Does that mean that you have no solace left?

Schrader: Less solace than I did at the time, trying to make the best of a horrible situation a year ago. It is distressing that folks now are indeed re-embracing his banner. I would hope that would indicate that they are putting their party into oblivion. I don’t think Americans writ-large are that way. And as you pointed out, there are still a significant number, not a great number, but a significant number of Republicans that have gone on to continue to repudiate him at great political risk. You know, Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, John Katko, a bunch of my friends in the House of Representatives on the other side of the aisle continue to just speak honestly. They’re not vindictive, they’re not going after him or anything. They’re just saying that what he did at that time was terrible and wrong. Just saw an interview with Tom Rice, talking about exactly the same thing. So I think there are those that it’s all about political expediency, getting reelected and they’re afraid of him, that they’re going to have to deal with that, come judgment day. But there are a lot of Republicans and I’d like to think the vast number of non-affiliated voters that continue to reflect upon what happened on January 6 a year ago and realize that is absolutely not the thing to do and that that President caused that to happen and he should be held accountable and so should those in his party that continue to embrace that action.

Miller: Kurt Schrader, thanks for joining us today. I appreciate it.

Schrader: Thanks, Dave.

Miller: Kurt Schrader is a Democratic US Congressman representing Oregon’s 5th district.

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