Yesterday, pro-Trump activists turned rioters stormed the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. to interrupt Congress from certifying the 2020 presidential election results. Rioters smashed windows, raided offices and looted parts of the building in a scene reminiscent of unrest in Iraq or Yugoslavia. Amongst them was 14-year Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt.
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Dispelling any notion that there exists in America a sinister deep state that is secretly in control, the rioters were successful in revealing the vulnerabilities of America's sacred institutions. Despite billions of dollars in defense spending and the militarization of police forces, the rioters handily pushed aside the Capitol police and other security personnel.
Former Secret Service Agent Bill Gage told Connecting Vets that the Capitol police are, "disgruntled, poorly trained and get hypnotized by years and years of access control duties. The vast majority of them just hit buttons all day to operate barricades or gates." Clearly, they were not up to the challenge posed by the rioters.
"There is no plan in place there for evacuation, for being overrun. With over 500 members of Congress (Senate and House) plus staff, it makes it very difficult to evac all of them, but nonetheless, there should be some plan in place. There isn't one," Gage said, adding that only the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team (HRT) would be capable of attempting such a large-scale emergency evacuation.
If the goal of the insurrectionists was to reveal the U.S. government as a hollowed-out institution, as an artifice of what it once was, chugging along as a matter of tradition but without the legitimacy that it previously had in the eyes of the public, then they may have succeeded.
Lawmakers were evacuated and locked down in the complex with just a moment's notice, with one of the insurrectionists sitting down behind a desk in the office of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, which still had an email inbox open on the screen. Boxes with electoral ballots in them had to be hurried off the floor of the Senate before the rioters arrived moments later.
Babbitt was among those insurrections, with her hair tied back, a blue Trump 2020 flag worn over her back like a cape. Footage emerged from inside the Capitol building, showing the rioters near a stairwell, attempting to gain access through another door when a single shot rings out.
Capitol police arrive, coming up the stairs as Babbitt slumps down on her back at the top of the steps. "Active shooter!" someone yells. A pool of blood spreads beneath her as she stares upward, her eyes blank. People swarm around her screaming for help, but clearly unsure of what to do. Within a minute, someone in the crowd says, "she's gone."
Babbitt's death was not an aberration. For years, the most powerful man in the world, a sitting American president, has spouted lies and conspiracy theories about the government, including his own cabinet. He condoned the so-called Proud Boys, refused to denounce QAnon, and energized his base by falsely claiming that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.
While liaison teams from Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) arrived at the Pentagon to help advise if the Capitol building needed to be stormed by soldiers, Trump had a tense phone call with former President George W. Bush, according to a source with visibility on that national security council who spoke to Connecting Vets on the condition of anonymity. Right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh also had a phone call with the president, also attempting to reason with him, the source said.
The most reasonable that the president could muster was a video he posted on social media while insurrections were still occupying the Capitol building. In the video, he repeated lies about the election being stolen while asking the insurrectionists to stand down.
Meanwhile, Babbitt was rushed to the hospital and pronounced dead. After leaving the Air Force she started a small business offering pool cleaning services and last year she got married. Her social media is a swamp of QAnon conspiracy theories and video rants about politics.
The QAnon conspiracy is attractive to many military veterans, as Connecting Vets has previously reported. QAnon offers a sense of belonging and camaraderie that veterans often lose when they leave the military. QAnon also casts its adherents as heroes fighting satanic villains, which is a world view that most veterans already relate to.
Predictably, Babbitt's social media shows that she followed and tweeted QAnon and MAGA personas and caricatures such as Jack Posobiac, Lin Wood and Michael Flynn. She posted videos of herself ranting about border controls from the front seat of her car, a recognizable genre of social media posts which many people share and derive their political opinions from.
Another rioter, driven out of the capital building after being pepper-sprayed said she was named Elizabeth from Knoxville, Tennessee. When asked what she was doing there she said, "We're storming the capital, it's a revolution," between her tears.
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But unlike actual soldiers or revolutionaries who die fighting for something, Babbitt lost her life for a fictional conspiracy. Her mind had been captured by a participatory live-action roleplaying game called QAnon. There are many others like her.
Reach Jack Murphy: jack@connectingvets.com or @JackMurphyRGR.
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