While a joint session of the US Congress was in the process of attempting to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s election win, a violent white mob incited by outgoing President Donald Trump descended upon the Capitol. As some Republican senators lied about the election outcome, their fervent supporters breached security barriers and stormed the building, breaking windows, destroying offices, and stealing items. I haven’t screamed that much at a television since the gassing at Lafayette Square last summer. It was jarring to see footage of lawmakers—many of whom had implicitly and explicitly supported the core beliefs of this mob—hiding, while pro-Trump extremists romped about as if they were on a school field trip.
It’s already been said countless times and yet is still worth repeating: The response to Black people storming the Capitol likely would have ended in mass bloodshed. One need only consider the treatment of Black Lives Matter protesters this summer. When white police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man in Minneapolis, by kneeling on his neck for nearly nine minutes, demonstrators in Minneapolis started a protest movement that quickly swept the rest of the country, including Washington, DC. There soon appeared a series of viral videos: police officers in Buffalo, New York, shoving an elderly man; cops using their vehicles to mow down peaceful protesters; and children being tear-gassed. And who can forget the searing image, not far from the scene of the rampage at the Capitol yesterday, of law enforcement gassing peaceful protesters so Trump could cross the street for a photoshoot, during which he held a Bible while standing in front of a historic church.
Read more at Mother Jones.