Congress shows defiance, unity
Certification of Electoral College vote resumes
WASHINGTON — Locking arms in a rare show of unity, Congress moved late Wednesday toward confirming President-elect Joe Biden’s victory after a mob of loyalists, urged on by President Donald Trump, stormed and occupied the Capitol on Wednesday, disrupting the final electoral count in a shocking display of violence that shook the core of American democracy.
There was no parallel in modern U.S. history, with insurgents acting in the president’s name vandalizing Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office, smashing windows, looting art and briefly taking control of the Senate chamber, where they took turns posing for photographs with fists up on the dais where Vice President Mike Pence had just presided.
Outside the building, they erected a gallows, punctured the tires of a police SUV, and left a note on its windshield saying, “PELOSI IS SATAN.”
By the time the Senate reconvened, hours after lawmakers had been evacuated from a Capitol overrun by rebels carrying pro-Trump paraphernalia, one of the nation’s most polarizing moments had yielded an unexpected window of solidarity that briefly eclipsed partisan division. Republicans and Democrats alike rose to denounce the violence and express their determination to carry out what they called a constitutionally sacrosanct function.
“To those who wreaked havoc in our Capitol today, you did not win,” Pence said in a sharp break from Trump, who had praised the mob. “Violence never wins. Freedom wins. And this is still the people’s house.”
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and the majority leader, said the “failed insurrection” had only clarified Congress’ purpose.
“They tried to disrupt our democracy,” he said. “They failed.”
Under pressure from their colleagues, some Republicans who had planned several hours of objections to Biden’s victory agreed to drop their challenges. But Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri pressed forward with a challenge to Pennsylvania’s electors, pushing the certification process deep into the night.
Lawmakers earlier in the night debated an objection to Arizona’s results lodged just before the violence broke out in the Capitol. The House blocked the attempt with a 303-121 vote. The Senate offered as sharp rebuke with a 93-6 vote.
Contesting the results
The upheaval unfolded on a day when Democrats secured a stunning pair of victories in runoff elections in Georgia, winning effective control of the Senate and the complete levers of power in Washington. And it arrived as Congress met for what would normally have been a perfunctory and ceremonial session to declare Biden’s election.
From the start, Trump’s allies, acting at his behest, had been determined to use the session to formally contest the outcome. Driving a painful wedge among Republicans, they trumpeted his false claims of voting fraud and initially gave voice inside the Capitol to those who ultimately forced their way in, stopping the process in its tracks.
Lawmakers and Pence mostly took shelter together near the Capitol, amid violent clashes between protesters and lawenforcement, but small groups reported being stranded for a time in offices and hideaways throughout the building.
Capitol Police, reinforced by the FBI and National Guard in tactical gear, successfully retook the Capitol complex more than three hours of mayhem.
The siege was the climax of a weekslong campaign by Trump, filled with baseless claims of fraud and outright lies, to try to overturn a democratically decided election that he lost.
He fought the result in court with dozens of spurious lawsuits that he lost. He outright pressured Republican leaders in key battleground states to reverse the will of the voters. And he fought, at last, to turn the congressional counting into the site of his final stand.
“We gather due to a selfish man’s injured pride, and the outrage of supporters who he has deliberately misinformed for the past two months and stirred to action this very morning,” said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, and the 2012 presidential nominee. “What happened here today was an insurrection incited by the president of the United States.”
Far from discouraging confrontation, Trump had encouraged his supporters earlier Wednesday to confront Republican lawmakers going against him to side with the Constitution.
“We will never concede,” he told a group of thousands gathered near the White House, calling members of his own party preparing to finalize his loss “weak Republicans, pathetic Republicans” whose leadership had gone “down the tubes.”
He then repeatedly told them to march to the Capitol, where the vote tallying was about to get underway. The violence began a little more than two hours later.
In a speech just before the violence broke out, McConnell, the most powerful Republican on Capitol Hill, forcefully rebuked Trump and members of his own party, warning that the drive to overturn a legitimate election risked sending democracy into “a death spiral.”
“The voters, the courts and the states have all spoken,” said McConnell, the majority leader. “If we overrule them all, it would damage our republic forever.”
Pence rebuffs Trump
Yet even as he spoke, it was becoming clear that the vicious cycle had already been unleashed. Within an hour, McConnell was in the grip of his Capitol Police detail and being rushed out of his chamber with other senators as members of his own party chanted curses to his name.
Trump had also intensely pressured Pence, who as vice president oversees the counting, to go rogue and unilaterally throw out the votes of key battleground states Trump lost. Shortly before the session began, Pence denied him in a bold statement after four years of loyal alliance. “I do not believe that the founders of our country intended to invest the vice president with unilateral authority to decide which electoral votes should be counted during the joint session of Congress, and no vice president in American history has ever asserted such authority,” he wrote.
Once the counting got underway, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona quickly lodged the first such objection to Gosar’s home state, sending senators and House members to their respective chambers for up to two hours of debate on Trump’s baseless fraud claims.
As the House and Senate separately debated the objection, security rushed Pence out of the Senate chamber, and the Capitol building was placed on lockdown after the demonstrators surged past barricades and law enforcement toward the legislative chambers.