On Jan. 6, 2021, approximately 10,000 people tried to cease the peaceable switch of energy, urged on by President Trump.
They violently assaulted the U.S. Capitol and a few of them violently assaulted greater than 140 law enforcement officials guarding the Capitol with quite a lot of weapons.
I do know all this to be true as a result of I used to be a type of officers.
Crushed, overwhelmed, and with a watch gouged, my colleagues and I held the road towards overwhelming numbers of rioters lengthy sufficient for Congress and the vice chairman to get to security, and later that evening the 2020 presidential election was licensed.
A Capitol Police officer injured throughout the riot suffered a stroke the next day and died. Four other officers who defended the Capitol that day dedicated suicide inside months.
For a quick, shining second, Congress was unified in its concern of what election lies had wrought and their gratitude towards their guardians. It didn’t final lengthy, after all.
However within the dying embers of afterglow, they handed a legislation requiring {that a} plaque be made and put in on the west entrance of the Capitol, honoring the women and men who defended democracy that day.
The plaque was made, but it surely now sits within the basement of the Capitol, hidden from the general public. The individuals chargeable for its set up all cross the buck as to why the legislation just isn’t being adopted and the plaque stays hidden away.
I’m suing the Architect of the Capitol to pressure the legislation to be adopted and a plaque put in because the legislation prescribes.
Let me first let you know what has no bearing on this go well with: I’m not doing this out of some need for self-aggrandizement. I’ve obtained greater than my fair proportion of reward, and by nature I’m not a public individual. I’m not working for workplace. I don’t have a e book or an album or a podcast to advertise, and this under no circumstances helps my profession.
I’m not getting paid to do that. This lawsuit and promotion of the trigger is alone time and my very own dime.
I’m not doing this as some favor for politicians who’ve proven me kindness; I’m all the time grateful for his or her assist, however that they had no hand on this authorized motion. And that is about one thing extra necessary.
The explanations I’m doing this must be apparent to anybody with clear eyes and a functioning ethical compass. I’m suing to have a plaque put in as a result of my colleagues deserve it.
These of us who misplaced their well being, their jobs, their peace of thoughts and their lives should be remembered for his or her sacrifice.
I’m doing this as a result of those that discover that day’s riot inconvenient to their energy try to rewrite historical past, claiming that the individuals who attacked our Capitol are patriots, that their trigger was simply and their actions cheap.
In contrast to these deceivers, a lot of whom had been cowering within the Capitol whereas my colleagues took the beating meant for them, I’ve no qualms talking the reality about that day. I noticed the hatred of their hearts and felt the violence of their minds.
Daniel Hodges is a Metropolitan Police Officer and a celebration to a new lawsuit towards the Architect of the Capitol to compel the set up of the congressionally mandated January 6 memorial.