east side. attempting to break a window on the east front. capitol has been breached on the east side. armed with sticks, flagpoles, riot shields, they had stormed past and overpowered police, who could do little but coax and steer them away from lawmakers. my challenge today is not about the good people of arizona we ll stand in recess until the call of the chair. the rioters weren t just in the building. at the moment the senate adjourned, they were streaming straight toward the senate chambers and vice president mike pence. senator mitt romney is about to head straight into a mob but is intercepted by a single capitol
theory profiteer with the organizer of stop the steal, ali alexander in tow, begins his own march to the capitol grounds. this is history happening! i skipped, literally skipped with my flag all the way to the capitol. in the crowd, ashli babbitt. we are walking to the capitol in a mob. there s an estimated over 3 million people here today. so despite what the media tells you, boots on ground definitely say something different. there is a sea of nothing but red, white, and blue patriots. this is what you get with at 1:26 p.m., u.s. capitol police order the capitol complex to begin evacuations. two minutes later, a call is made requesting the national guard. pipe bombs are being investigated nearby at the headquarters of the dnc and rnc. hold the line! whoa, this is bad. this is bad. by 2:00 p.m., both sides of the capitol are surrounded with
it s over! you better run, cops! police officers are being crushed trying to keep the surging mob from gaining entry to the lower west tunnel. one officer, daniel hodges, screaming as his body is pressed into the door. officer michael fanone had heard the radio calls and rushed to help. this is not a law enforcement operation. his body camera captures the moment he faced the mob of thousands. we were in a medieval battle. this is hand-to-hand combat in its most brutal form. the rioters had come armed and were fighting to get inside. they hit police with bats,
more than 100 combat missions in iraq and afghanistan, plotted to escape. there was a part of me that was thinking, if this mob breaks through those doors, they re going to try to kill us all, and i need to do what i need to do to protect myself, protect my colleagues, protect others. on the capitol s front lawn, the mob was becoming incensed. usa! donald trump had just tweeted. mike pence didn t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country and our constitution. there is a scaffold and a noose and chants of hang mike pence. security is now whisking pence and his family down a back stairway. i think trump wanted the crowd to turn into a mob. i think he wanted them to disrupt the certification of the electoral college votes to give him more time to play out some other scenario that might yet end up with him being president.
at 2:12 p.m. using a police shield, proud boy dominic pezzola breaks a window on the capitol s west side, and the mob starts pouring in. josh pruitt jumps a railing and follows other proud boys through a now open door. what did you do? walking through a front door being held open by cops that waved me in. you know that s not true. i know that is true. there s proof of it. there s video of it. when i walked into the front door, the cops were at the door, and they were standing to the sides of the door, and they were waving people in. yeah. the video i saw of that moment mm-hmm. was a couple of cops overwhelmed by a mob. well, you didn t watch all the videos, then. i didn t? i think i did. it was all caught on video. here is josh pruitt walking through the door 70 seconds after the window breaks. it is almost the same moment rioters smash windows on the