Why the Jan. 6 committee’s 845-page report wasn’t long enough
The committee blew its chance to make needed recommendations to our law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
If you haven’t yet read the final report of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, let me issue this spoiler alert: It was all Trump’s fault. In more than 800 pages of painstakingly assembled evidence, the committee convincingly makes the case that former President Donald J. Trump was the catalyst behind the violence at the Capitol and the attempts to overturn a valid 2020 presidential election. The committee’s investigation is compelling, and its findings are damning. Yet, what the committee chose not to fully investigate, and not to find, leaves a gaping hole in its otherwise impressive work.
The committee’s report failed to fully address the law enforcement and intelligence-related failures that could have prevented or mitigated the Jan. 6, 2021, violence at our nation’s Capitol. That missing piece makes it more likely than not that the domestic terrorism we saw that day could happen again. By deciding to make “Trump did it” its mantra, the committee let that message, albeit a legitimate one, get in the way of its larger mission.
