Congressman Hank Johnson was one of the legislators inside of the Capitol on January 6 when a mob of Trump supporters breached the building. Five people, including a Capitol Police officer, died as a result of the riots.
The Georgia democrat called into The Rashad Richey Morning Show on News-Talk 1380 AM WAOK to talk about what he experienced on Wednesday, and shared why he thinks the breach of the Capitol was “a very serious coup attempt.”
In a moment-by-moment description of the saga, Johnson shared details of the harrowing moments in which rioters banged at the door, and how when Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was swept away by law enforcement, he “knew that something was deeply wrong.”
The congressman also detailed how the sound of a gunshot caused everyone around him to hit the floor. While he is appreciative of the Capitol Police officers that were with the group, he still feels that there was a lack of oversight from law enforcement.
“I still give kudos to those Capitol Hill Police officers and Sergeant at Arms officials who were down on the ground. They were with us, trying to extract us from a difficult situation,” he said. “They are not the problem as far as what happened. There was a lapse in judgement further up the chain, the command structure.”
After the authorities were able to take control of the Capitol again, Johnson saw a “horde of individuals” who were held at gunpoint by law enforcement on the third floor. However, he later found out that those rioters “apparently were released.” Johnson sees this as “evidence of collusion between those at the White House and those in the House of Representatives itself.”
Johnson shared that he also believes that “there seems to be some collusion” in law enforcement “that took place to help with this overthrow attempt.” The congressman continued, saying that “we know that we’ve got racist skinheads and nationalist people in our military ranks, and we know that we have them in our police department. We know that we have them in the FBI, the CIA.”
The congressman believes that “if [the rioters] had been able to get to where we were, and string some rope on the railings and start hanging people, start killing people. There’s nobody there to check them through security, so there’s no telling how many guns were brought into the Capitol.”
When asked if he believes that what happened at the Capitol was, in part, an inside job, Johnson said “yes, and I’m saying don’t forget that there was a group of representatives that went over to the White House and met with Trump a week or two ago.”
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