Lawmakers float idea of memorializing riot

But victims in Congress can’t agree on basic facts of what happened Jan. 6.

Rep. Jason Crow, D-colo., kept the pen he was prepared to brandish as a weapon if the rioters who stormed the Capitol in the name of Donald Trump made it to where he was in the House chamber on Jan. 6, 2021.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, framed an official tally certifying President Joe Biden’s electoral victory, along with a letter opener used to open an electoral vote ballot, after the tear gas had cleared following the assault.

And upon request, Rep. Andy Kim, D-N.J., donated to the Smithsonian the blue J. Crew suit he wore during the attack, though he kept a broken golden eagle he gingerly removed from the debris while picking up trash in the Rotunda after the mayhem.

“They’re artifacts of the day and what happened,” Crow said in a recent interview. “I think it’s important for my family to be able to have those things as part of the ability to tell that story in the future.”

In the days after the attack, many who lived through it clung to tangible relics of the day — from panicked text messages they sent their families to the crumpled escape hoods they hurriedly unwrapped inside the House chamber — assembling their own makeshift memorials to one of the most destructive events in the history of the building.

But one year later, lawmakers and historians are still debating how Congress itself should memorialize the riot at the Capitol, which is both a working legislative body that came under attack and a living museum of American history. They are grappling with the thorny question of how, if at all, to officially mark an assault whose victims cannot agree on the basic facts of what happened.

The National Museum of American History, a branch of the Smithsonian, collected protest signs, posters and banners from the assault. Some of the

debris and damaged items from the Capitol complex were handed over to the Justice Department. And a spokeswoman for the Architect of the Capitol, which oversees the building and its grounds, said the agency was examining options to display a collection once prosecutorial work against those who breached the building had concluded.

Some lawmakers are pressing for a far more detailed accounting of the day. House Democrats have introduced legislation that would require a permanent exhibit in the Capitol. A similar resolution was used to install a plaque that pays tribute to two Capitol Police officers killed defending the building from a gunman in 1998.

“It’s going to have to be told, and we have to make sure that we’re preserving that, because ultimately, what it shows is that democracy can be fragile if people don’t reinvigorate it and fight for it,” said Crow, a sponsor of the bill. “You have to make sure we’re telling that story to ensure that we have the resolve to do what’s necessary to preserve our democracy.”

Multiple lawmakers have called for the preservation of damaged items, particularly a cracked window in the Rotunda doors that open onto the plaza. That window has since been replaced, but it is unclear whether the shattered pane was kept.

“Hopefully, they will preserve some

of what happened here so that the people can come and see it and remember what happened,” said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-utah, who broke with his party to support forming a bipartisan commission to investigate the attack.

But Republicans blocked that inquiry, and most of them have spent the past year downplaying or denying the significance of the assault, making it unlikely that they would back legislation to memorialize it.

The Capitol, of course, is filled with reminders of what happened. Riot shields are propped outside entrances to the building, and metal detectors have been installed outside the House chamber. Capitol Police officers still wrap black mourning bands around their badges to pay tribute to the colleagues they lost in connection with the riot.

But there is no official site or monument in the Capitol dedicated to explaining what happened, or reflecting on the wounds inflicted on the institution and American democracy itself on Jan. 6.

“I’ve still lacked the words to be able to describe to my kids what happened that day,” Kim said in an interview. “When we go through collective trauma, it’s often helpful to have some kind of collective outlet in which one can reflect on this and think through this. I find it to be just a missed opportunity for us to pay tribute to this building.”

AL DRAGO/THE NEW YORK TIMES U.S. Capitol Police officers gather for morning roll call Thursday, the anniversary of the assault led by Donald Trump supporters aimed at disrupting the certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election.

DOUG MILLS/THE NEW YORK TIMES In a speech Thursday in Statuary Hall, President Joe Biden warns that democracy and the “promise of America” are at risk and calls on the public to “stand for the rule of law, to preserve the flame of democracy.”