LITANY OF ERROR

Acting Capitol Police Chief Apologizes, Says They ‘Should Have Been More Prepared’ for Riot

The chief outlined several failures on Jan 6., from poor radio communications to an hour-long wait for National Guard back-up to be authorized.

The acting chief of the U.S. Capitol Police apologized for her department’s failure to prevent the Jan. 6 riot, admitting in a statement Tuesday that “we knew there was a strong potential for violence” including from militia and white supremacist groups. Yogananda Pittman, who became chief after Steven Sund resigned in the wake of the riot, said police were overmatched by “tens of thousands of insurrections”. She said she doesn’t believe “there was any preparations that would have allowed for an open campus in which lawful protesters could exercise their first amendment right to free speech and at the same time prevented the attack on Capitol grounds that day.” But she outlined a litany of failures in their response, from radio comms that kept dropping out to a one-hour wait for National Guard deployments to be authorized.