The Capitol Steps – January 6 – A strange gathering.
Five years ago today – seems like another lifetime. In what began as an otherwise normal transfer of office from outgoing President Trump to incoming President Biden, turned catastrophic and deadly as crowds gathered and descended on the Capitol building with the sole intention of halting the count of Electoral votes and officially pronouncing Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 election.
Reactions ran the gamut from shock and total dismay to passing off the riot as “boys will be boys”. Many swore up and down that it was really, honestly, a bunch of tourists getting together for a tour of the Capitol and the crowd just “got too big”.
But cameras and the media were telling a different story – crowds storming the Capitol building, overwhelming guards – smashing doors and windows – racing through hallways, breaking into offices – in short, staged anarchy. All under the guise of disrupting the legal transfer of power under the baseless claim the election was “stolen”.
It took several hours to get everything under control – but the damage had already been done. An unprecedented act took place – an act which stunned and shocked America, the ones who watched in disbelief as a sacred institution was assaulted and desecrated, whose leader feigned ignorance with shrugged shoulders – and waited for “next time”.
And it was a shock to those in the media covering it at the time. We’ve all seen the videos; the violence up close and personal. But radio was also in the midst of the chaos, even though anchors back at the studio were trying to keep things as “normal as possible, with some outlets running commercials in between reports of carnage. It was a truly bizarre day and one with no frame of reference. Like everything that has gone on since, there was no historic precedence to point to – at least precedence as it was presented in the age of electronic media – one would have to go back to the 1800’s for anything remotely resembling this sort of disruption of government and general lawless chaos in Washington.
So as a reminder – and a reminder it was only five years ago. Here is a two hour excerpt of news from Washington D.C. station WTOP as it was happening – starting around 1:00 pm Eastern time to approximately 3:30 pm on January 6, 2021.
