Subterms
Presenter helps dun-coloured pants also worn by President-elect Biden roar back into geek chic fashionSteve Kornacki, the MSNBC pundit who broke the internet in November with his khaki trousers, returned to TV screens for the Georgia Senate runoffs this week. Related: ‘You can’t lose a single vote’: can Biden navigate the 50-50 Senate? Continue reading… More
Among the most shocking images to emerge from Wednesday’s attack on the US Capitol were members of the pro-Trump mob wielding baseball bats and bearing “Keep America Great” banners rampaging over the inaugural platform on the West Front of the building where four years ago Donald Trump took his oath of office.
The sight of rioters running amok amid clouds of teargas on the very spot where their cherished leader swore to “preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the United States” was not just symbolically chilling. It underlined the massive security challenge now facing the US government as it hurtles towards the next inauguration – that of Joe Biden – just days away.
As with any inauguration in modern times, Biden’s ascendancy to the presidency on 20 January has been declared a “national security special event”. That awards it the highest level of security preparation, with all the phenomenal firepower that federal agencies led by the Secret Service and FBI can muster.
In the wake of the attack on the Capitol, that already elevated security level is now being ramped up significantly. The risk of the incoming president and vice-president, three former presidents, the nine members of the US supreme court, and most members of Congress – all of whom are expected to attend the inauguration – being exposed to a repeat attack by the Trump-incited mob is beyond contemplation. More
Key events
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3.35pm EST15:35
West Virginia legislator arrested for alleged role in Capitol riot
3.10pm EST15:10
Biden agrees with Trump’s decision not to attend inauguration
2.59pm EST14:59
Biden on Trump impeachment: ‘That’s a decision for the Congress’
2.53pm EST14:53
Perdue formally concedes to Ossoff in Georgia Senate race
2.19pm EST14:19
Biden introduces nominees to lead commerce and labor departments
2.05pm EST14:05
Biden offers sympathy to family of fallen Capitol Police officer
1.56pm EST13:56
Rioter from viral photo in Pelosi’s office arrested – report
Live feed
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4.45pm EST16:45
The White House has issued a statement on the prospect of an unprecedented second round of impeachment proceedings against Donald Trump.
“As President Trump said yesterday, this is a time for healing and unity as one nation. A politically motivated impeachment against a president with 12 days remaining in his term will only serve to further divide our great country,” it said.
Updated
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4.23pm EST16:23
Donald Trump will reportedly fly to Mar-a-Lago the day before Joe Biden’s inauguration, according to CNN.
Kaitlan Collins
(@kaitlancollins)
After announcing he won’t attend his inauguration, President Trump is currently scheduled to head to Mar-a-Lago the day before President-elect Biden is sworn in. Our report from the White House today: pic.twitter.com/gtIcNmVAYP
January 8, 2021
Trump announced earlier today that he would not attend Biden’s inauguration, breaking 150 years of tradition of outgoing presidents attending their successors’ inaugurations.
It’s unclear whether Mike Pence will attend the inauguration, although Biden said today that the vice-president is “welcome” to be part of the event.
4.13pm EST16:13
A draft of House Democrats’ articles of impeachment against Donald Trump includes an article for “incitement of insurrection.”
The draft, obtained by CNN, accuses the president of having “gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of government.”
“President Trump’s conduct on January 6, 2021 was consistent with his prior efforts to subvert and obstruct the certification of the results of the 2020 presidential election,” the draft says.
“He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coordinate branch of government. He thereby betrayed his trust as President, to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.”
House Democrats could file the articles of impeachment as soon as Monday, according to multiple reports, potentially setting up a mid-week vote.
3.58pm EST15:58
Jen Psaki, the incoming White House press secretary, said Joe Biden will receive his second dose of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine on Monday.
Seung Min Kim
(@seungminkim)
>@jrpsaki says Biden will get his second dose of the coronavirus vaccine on Monday
January 8, 2021
During a virtual briefing with reporters, Psaki added that some members of the incoming administration, including close aides to Biden and Kamala Harris as well as cabinet secretaries, are starting to receive the vaccine as well.
3.35pm EST15:35
West Virginia legislator arrested for alleged role in Capitol riot
Derrick Evans, a newly elected legislator in West Virginia, has been arrested on federal charges related to the violent riot at the Capitol.
Chad Hedrick
(@WSAZChadHedrick)
#BREAKING WV Delegate Derrick Evans has been taken into federal custody. He’s charged after allegedly entering a restricted area of the US Capitol with rioters Wednesday. A woman saying he was his grandmother came out telling us to leave as he was put in a car. #WSAZ pic.twitter.com/wK2RqFcaF7
January 8, 2021
A reporter for the local NBC affiliate WSAZ shared a video of Evans, who serves in the West Virginia House of Delegates, being taken into federal custody.
A woman who identified herself as Evans’ grandmother confronted the reporter as he was put in a car.
Asked for a comment about the arrest, the woman said, “He’s a fine man, and thank you, Mr Trump, for invoking a riot.”
3.16pm EST15:16
Joe Biden said he believed the violent siege of the Capitol made it easier to unify the country because Americans of both parties were horrified by what took place.
“My overarching objective is to unify this country,” Biden told reporters in Wilmington, Delaware. “We must unify this country.”
The president-elect applauded Republicans who have denounced the violence and the baseless claims of widespread election fraud that helped spur it, such as Mitt Romney.
Biden noted he spoke to Romney this morning, and he applauded the Republican senator as “a man of enormous integrity”.
Asked whether senators Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz should resign for supporting Donald Trump’s lies about the election, as some Democrats have suggested, Biden said, “I think they should be just flat beaten the next time they run.”
The president-elect has now wrapped up his event in Wilmington.
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3.10pm EST15:10
Biden agrees with Trump’s decision not to attend inauguration
Joe Biden said Donald Trump’s decision not to attend his inauguration is “one of the few things he and I have ever agreed on”.
“It’s a good thing, him not showing up,” the president-elect told reporters in Wilmington, Delaware. “He has exceeded even my worst notions about him. He’s embarrassed us around the world.”
Trump announced earlier today that he would not attend Biden’s inauguration, making him the first president since 1869 not to attend his successor’s inauguration.
Asked later about Mike Pence, Biden said the vice-president is “welcome to attend”.
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3.04pm EST15:04
Joe Biden condemned the rioters who stormed the Capitol as “a bunch of thugs,” “domestic terrorists” and “white supremacists.”
The president-elect specifically called out the rioters who wore shirts saying “6MWE.”
“6MWE” is an anti-Semitic phrase that stands for “Six million wasn’t enough,” referring to the six million Jewish people who were murdered during the Holocaust.
“These shirts they’re wearing? These are a bunch of thugs,” Biden said.
2.59pm EST14:59
Biden on Trump impeachment: ‘That’s a decision for the Congress’
Joe Biden is now taking questions from reporters at his event in Wilmington, Delaware, after introducing his nominees to lead the labor and commerce departments.
No surprise here: the first question (from CNN’s Arlette Saenz) was focused on House Democrats’ plans to file articles of impeachment against Donald Trump, after the president incited a violent mob to storm the Capitol.
“I’ve thought for a long, long time that President Trump wasn’t fit to hold the job. That’s why I ran,” Biden said.
When pressed on whether he would advise a Democratic lawmaker to support impeachment, the president-elect dodged, saying, “That’s a decision for the Congress to make. I’m focused on my job.”
Biden noted he would be having a phone call with Democratic congressional leaders later this afternoon, when impeachment will likely come up.
2.53pm EST14:53
Perdue formally concedes to Ossoff in Georgia Senate race
Former Republican senator David Perdue has formally conceded to Jon Ossoff in their Georgia Senate runoff race.
“Although we won the general election, we came up just short of Georgia’s 50% rule, and now I want to congratulate the Democratic Party and my opponent for this runoff win,” Purdue said in a statement.
After a bitter campaign defined by sharp attacks from both candidates, Perdue did not mention Ossoff by name in his concession statement.
Purdue’s concession comes one day after Republican Kelly Loeffler conceded to Democrat Raphael Warnock in the other Georgia Senate race.
After the victories of Warnock and Ossoff, the Senate is now evenly split 50-50 between Democrats and Republicans. Once Kamala Harris is sworn in as vice-president, Democrats will take the majority.
2.37pm EST14:37
Joe Biden’s event is ongoing, but the blog is going to pivot back to Capitol Hill, where a prominent Democrat addressed calls for two of her Republican colleagues to resign.
Patty Murray, the third-ranking Senate Democrat, said she believed senators Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz should resign for their role in stirring up baseless doubts about the legitimacy of the election, after a violent pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol on Wednesday.
Senator Patty Murray
(@PattyMurray)
At the end of the day, our job is to keep this country a democracy where voices win, not brute force. Any Senator who stands up and supports the power of force over the power of democracy has broken their oath of office. Senators Hawley and Cruz should resign.
January 8, 2021
“I come to the Capitol every day to fight for what I believe in,” the Washington Democrat said in a statement. “I use my voice to tell people what I believe to be right, and I listen to the other side. We hear each other out, we vote, and whoever has the votes wins. And I accept that. Do I always like the outcome? No, but I accept it, because that is what our democracy requires.”
Murray condemned the rioters who stormed the Capitol on Wednesday, describing them as “people who don’t accept democracy, and want to take this country by use of force.”
“As a Senator, I respect every member who disagrees with my ideas. I reserve my right to use my voice to fight for what I believe in. But at the end of the day, our job is to keep this country a democracy where voices win, not brute force,” Murray said.
“Any Senator who stands up and supports the power of force over the power of democracy has broken their oath of office. Senators Hawley and Cruz should resign.”
2.24pm EST14:24
Joe Biden said he gave “serious consideration” to nominating Bernie Sanders as labor secretary, but the two agreed that it was too risky to jeopardize control of the Senate.
CBS News
(@CBSNews)
Biden says he gave “serious consideration” to nominating Bernie Sanders for labor secretary, but they both decided against it to avoid vacating seat and risking Democrats’ Senate controlHe and Sanders will still “work closely on our shared agenda of increasing worker power” pic.twitter.com/97SRFlrOAj
January 8, 2021
After Democrats swept the Georgia Senate races this week, they took control of the chamber, which will now be 50-50, with vice-president-elect Kamala Harris providing a tie-breaking 51st vote for Democrats.
Sanders has served as one of Vermont’s senators since 2007, and his cabinet nomination would trigger a special election.
The labor secretary nomination ultimately went to Marty Walsh, the mayor of Boston, and Biden said Sanders told him he had made a good choice.
Updated
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2.19pm EST14:19
Biden introduces nominees to lead commerce and labor departments
Joe Biden is now introducing his nominees to lead the commerce and labor departments, rounding out his cabinet nominations.
Gina Raimondo, the governor of Rhode Island, will be nominated to lead the commerce department, and Marty Walsh, the mayor of Boston, will be nominated as labor secretary.
Biden celebrated his nominees as the right people to help the millions of Americans desperately seeking financial assistance amid the coronavirus pandemic.
2.16pm EST14:16
Joe Biden said he would lay out the groundwork for the next round of coronavirus relief next week, emphasizing the need to offer more financial assistance to American families amid the pandemic.
“We need more direct relief flowing to families, small businesses,” Biden said. “Our focus will be on small businesses on Main Street.”
The president-elect also criticized the rollout of coronavirus vaccines so far. “Vaccines give us hope, but the rollout has been a travesty,” Biden said.
The Democrat previously pledged to distribute 100 million doses of the vaccine over his first 100 days in office.
2.11pm EST14:11
Joe Biden noted that, with his announcement today, he will have completed his cabinet nominations, and he called on the Senate to swiftly confirm his nominees.
The president-elect applauded himself for building a cabinet that “looks like America,” noting that this would be the first presidential cabinet to be evenly divided between men and women.
Updated
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2.05pm EST14:05
Biden offers sympathy to family of fallen Capitol Police officer
Joe Biden has taken the podium in Wilmington, Delaware, for his event to introduce members of his economic team.
The president-elect opened his remarks by expressing his “deep sympathy” for the family of Brian Sicknick, the Capitol Police officer who died as a result of his injuries from the violent siege of the Capitol.
“The people responsible should be held accountable — and they will be,” Biden said.
Biden also said he would take reporters’ questions after he introduces his cabinet members, and he will likely be pressed on calls to remove Donald Trump from office.
Updated
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1.56pm EST13:56
Rioter from viral photo in Pelosi’s office arrested – report
The rioter who was photographed sitting in the office of House speaker Nancy Pelosi amid the violent siege of the Capitol has been arrested, according to multiple reports. More
Donald Trump announced on Friday that he would not attend the inauguration of Joe Biden on 20 January, after a violent mob of the president’s loyalists stormed the Capitol in an effort to overturn the result of the November election in an attack that left five people dead.His decision came as little surprise, but nevertheless breaks with a longstanding tradition of presidents attending their successors inauguration ceremonies in a symbolic demonstration of the peaceful transfer of power between administrations.“To all of those who have asked, I will not be going to the Inauguration on January 20th,” Trump wrote on Twitter.It remains uncertain if the vice-president, Mike Pence, will attend Biden’s swearing-in, which will take place on the steps of the Capitol under heightened security after the building was breached and vandalized on Wednesday.The presidential inauguration committee had already asked supporters not to travel to Washington to attend the ceremony due to the coronavirus pandemic.While refusing to give up his baseless claims that the election was stolen from him, Trump on Thursday recognized his defeat for the first time in a two-and-a-half-minute video posted on Twitter.“A new administration will be inaugurated on January 20,” he said, breaking a day of silence after the riots. “My focus now turns to ensuring a smooth, orderly and seamless transition of power. This moment calls for healing and reconciliation.”The circumstances around Trump’s departure from the White House at noon on 20 January are also unclear, though he is widely expected to return to his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. Before the Christmas holiday, Trump had reportedly discussed plans for holding an event to announce his plans to run for president in 2024 instead of attending Biden’s inauguration.Before his election in 2016 and again in 2020, Trump refused to explicitly commit to a peaceful transfer of power.After his loss to Biden, Trump insisted with any evidence that the election had been stolen and refused to accept his defeat. Instead he whipped up his supporters with wild claims of a vast conspiracy to rig the election against him, culminating in a rally in Washington on Wednesday when he urged them to “walk down to the Capitol” and register their discontent over the election. He added that “you will never take back our country with weakness”.Shortly thereafter, rioters loyal to the president overwhelmed police and stormed the capitol, where they shattered windows, vandalized congressional offices and stole property. The mob, who Trump later told “I love you” as he appealed for calm, disrupted the process of certifying the electoral college, the last step in affirming Biden’s victory.Members of Congress returned late in the evening on Wednesday to complete the process. Biden would be the next president of the United States, in a vote of 306 to 232.In the aftermath of the assault on the Capitol, several White House officials and at least two cabinet secretaries have resigned while calls are growing for Trump to be removed from office by the 25th Amendment or by impeachment. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has said the House is prepared to bring articles of impeachment against the president for a second time if the cabinet does not act to remove him.On Friday, she told lawmakers she discussed with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley, “available precautions for preventing an unstable president from initiating military hostilities or accessing the launch codes and ordering a nuclear strike”.Throughout American history, there have only been a handful of presidents who did not attend the swearing-in of his successor, including John Adams, John Quincy Adams and Andrew Johnson, the first US president to be impeached. After his resignation, Richard Nixon did not attend the inauguration of Gerald Ford.After losing to Trump in 2016, Hillary Clinton attended his inauguration in her capacity as the former first lady. At the time she said: “I’m here today to honor our democracy & its enduring values. I will never stop believing in our country & its future.” And in 1993, George HW Bush attended the inauguration of Clinton after losing his campaign for re-election.With the exception of Trump and Jimmy Carter, who is 96 and has suffered a series of health issues in recent years, all other former living presidents are expected to attend Biden’s inauguration. More
What was this desperado putsch supposed to achieve? The mob of face-painted LARPers, QAnon conspiracists, militiamen, neo-Nazis, Christian supremacists and endtimes preppers who invaded the Capitol building in Washington DC were never going to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.And yet they are far from a few isolated cranks. This crowd, whose actions are supported by 45% of Republican voters, had been called to the capital by Donald Trump. Their “protest” had been incited from the podium by both Trump and Rudi Giuliani, ramming home their betrayal myth that the election was stolen. Trump’s campaign to reverse the election results and subvert constitutional law, backed by several elected Republican officials, has repeatedly inspired violence. Trump has repeatedly backed the militias, from his bellowing approval of their anti-lockdown stunts to his support for vigilante violence against Black Lives Matter protesters, to his call for militia action on election day.While Trump had been kept under control by the Republican establishment for most of his tenure, the last year – since the lockdown protests began – saw a process of radicalisation of the armed base, the administration and its white suburban supporters. The further the extra-parliamentary right went, the more violent it became, the further Trump went. Any violent exhortation was justified by a hallucinatory anti-communism. What’s more, there has emerged a set of tacit alliances between law enforcement and armed vigilantes, as seen in the Black Lives Matter protests.Reporting and inquiries will shed light on what happened in the coming weeks, but serious questions need to be asked about how an armed mob was able to “storm” the Capitol building in the first place, wandering corridors to take selfies with cops, exploring computer screens left unmanned by hastily-evacuated staff and hunting for elected officials to confront. It stretches credulity to think they could have taken over the debating chamber, even after what appears to have been a tense armed standoff, without some kind of orchestrated or de facto acquiescence. Their braying triumphalism after they were evicted, claiming victory, glossed over both this and the extraordinarily delayed arrival of the National Guard.This is all indicative of an incipient fascism, laying the cultural and political groundwork for a violent, extra-parliamentary mass movement of the right. It is a mistake to assume that fascism must take the form of dictatorship. Far-right movements today are shaped by the same factors: the decomposition of parliamentary legitimacy and their inherited organisational weaknesses. In that context, wielding the power of office is a pedagogical, formative experience. It allows movements with thin civic roots to project influence at a national level and try things out.Fascism does not arrive on the scene with full uniform and programme. The Jewish socialist Arthur Rosenberg traced the origins of fascism as a mass movement to the period before the first world war, when millions were already infected by volkisch, racial-nationalist ideology, and by contempt for democratic government. It consolidates through experimentation, learning the ropes through episodes that, at first, appear amateurish and thuggish, from the beer hall (Munich) putsch to the demolition of the Babri Masjid. First as farce, then as tragedy.There has been, for some time, accumulating data suggestive of a political rupture on the right. The growing number of people, particularly among the rich, who favour some form of authoritarian government, is one sign. The string of popularly elected, and often re-elected, rightist governments militantly challenging liberal legal norms and institutions is another. The rise of lone-wolf murderers and conspiracist vigilantes is yet another. And there is the proliferation of militias and paramilitaries, often with close relationships to police and the military rank and file. As the contemporary historian Kathleen Belew’s work has demonstrated, many white-power and fascist currents were forged in the furnace of war.In the United States, the rupture has been building since before the Tea Party movement. During the 2008 election, paranoid racists brought guns and nooses to town hall meetings and called Obama a Muslim, the birth of the “birther” myth. It points to either a split in the Republican party or its complete capture by middle-class enragés. This is a grievous problem for ruthless GOP establishment operators such as Senators Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham, who spent years defending the Trump administration, using him to consolidate their electoral base, strengthen a minoritarian grip on government and take over the courts. Their traditional allies, including the National Association of Manufacturers, are not prepared to countenance a party this out of control – but they can’t simply throw away half of the Republican vote.And this is their problem. Trumpism is not an aberration, but a mass phenomenon. Trump greatly expanded his base between 2016 and 2020, adding more than 10 million votes to its total. He expanded into places and demographic constituencies thought to be closed to him. No other Republican presidential candidate could have done this. And it was achieved precisely through the same means that led to the spectacle in the Capitol. To hope that Joe Biden can defuse this by restoring civility and bipartisanship to Washington would be unforgivably complacent. The United States, and not just the United States, urgently needs an anti-fascist movement. We have not begun to see the end of this. More
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Wednesday was supposed to be a day of jubilation for organizers in Georgia.
Early that morning, news organizations projected that the Rev Raphael Warnock, a Democrat would win an upset victory over Senator Kelly Loeffler, making him the first Black senator ever elected from the state. Jon Ossoff was on the verge of defeating David Perdue in a second runoff. It was a dual result that would give Democrats control of the US Senate, and the first Democratic win for Georgia in decades.
After years of meticulously registering and organizing the state’s growing population of minority voters, Black voters turned out in droves and were responsible for powering Democrats to victory. It was a payoff years in the making.
But as the day wore on, those same organizers watched with horror as a pro-Trump mob took over the US Capitol in Washington, bypassing law enforcement officers and forcing lawmakers to evacuate. By the time the Associated Press formally declared Ossoff the winner in his race by mid-afternoon, it was no longer the biggest story of the day.
Felicia Davis, an organizer who is the convener of the Clayton county Black Women’s Roundtable, said her feelings shifted from when she woke up in the morning.
“I woke up feeling joy, I then went into a state of anxiety, and then finally I ended up horrified,” she said.
Deborah Scott, the executive director of Georgia Stand-Up, one of the groups that helped mobilize voters, said she and other organizers left their office on Wednesday morning on a high note, but the mood shifted just hours later. “It definitely was overshadowed,” she said. “You look at the paper today, and the election is almost an afterthought. I think that’s what they want, they want chaos.”
Watching the images on television, Scott said she couldn’t help but think of how much more aggressive police were towards Black Lives Matter protesters.
“Most Black people saw that and watched in horror and said it would be such a different thing if it was us,” Scott said. “It kind of took away from the feeling of ecstasy, like the people won, they chose who they wanted.”
Warnock’s Twitter feed underscored the whiplash of the day, the New York Times noted. At 1.55pm he sent out a tweet celebrating the historic nature of his win. His next tweet, less than two hours later, quoted Martin Luther King Jr and condemned the violence in Washington.
Senator-Elect Reverend Raphael Warnock
(@ReverendWarnock)
Georgia, we made history. I am forever grateful. pic.twitter.com/hQfCYKEo3q
January 6, 2021
Senator-Elect Reverend Raphael Warnock
(@ReverendWarnock)
In this moment of unrest, violence and anger, we must remember the words of Dr. King, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” Let each of us try to be a light to see our country out of this dark moment.
January 6, 2021
It had been a victory in Georgia that was made possible by months of methodical canvassing on display even in the final days of the race. In a final push early on Monday morning, canvassers with Georgia Stand-Up worked in pairs in a quiet suburban neighborhood, quickly placing leaflets on doors with information telling people how they could vote. Their goal was to knock on just over 6,000 doors in the final day, bringing their statewide total to 100,000.
On Wednesday evening, after the violence at the Capitol unfolded Stacey Abrams, the former Democratic candidate credited with leading efforts to mobilize minority voters, tweeted a reminder of that work, and the historic achievement in Georgia.
Stacey Abrams
(@staceyabrams)
While today’s terrible display of terror and meanness shakes us, let’s remember: @ossoff, Jewish son of an immigrant & @ReverendWarnock, first Black Senator from Georgia, will join a Catholic POTUS & the first woman, Black + Indian VP in our nation’s capital. God bless America.
January 7, 2021
The attack on the Capitol also took place as Republican lawmakers, led by Donald Trump, pushed forward with their effort to undermine confidence in the results of the 2020 race. Even though courts across the country have universally rejected Trump’s baseless claims of voter fraud, Republicans in Congress objected on Wednesday to the counting of electoral votes from swing states Joe Biden won in November.
Though the challenges were ultimately unsuccessful, they were still a form of voter suppression, said Helen Butler, executive director of the Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda, a civil rights group that also helped register voters.
“They’re trying to put doubt in our process and they’re trying to make sure that certain people don’t vote, it’s not counted,” she said. “Kind of putting water on fire, kind of dampening spirits. But we’re resilient and we’re not going to let that stop us. Because we intend to protect the right to vote.”
Scott said her group had already received calls from people in other southern states – North Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi – seeking to learn and replicate strategies in Georgia in their states.
“By the end of [the day] it was like ‘OK, we know more work has to be done now,” she said. “It’s gonna make us stronger. I see this, particularly the Georgia win, as a tipping point for the rest of the south.” More
“Are you watching this?” I was crossing the road, five minutes late to pick up the kids, and after reading the text, paused to scroll. Whoa. Instantly, I texted someone else. “Is your TV on?” “No.” “Turn it on.” After pick-up, we ran to a doctor’s appointment, where the receptionist had the TV on behind the desk. “This is insane,” he murmured, as someone in the waiting room read a news report aloud to his teenage daughter. When we got home, a few neighbours had come out of their apartments to mill, masked, in the hallway. “The numbers of people who support this look low, but it doesn’t have to be a majority,” said one, darkly.
The absorption into daily life of disastrous events is one the world has grown used to over the last 12 months, which isn’t to say each new disaster isn’t shocking. This is particularly true in America, where no matter how many times one is reminded that millions of Americans hold opinions that seem, to millions of others, actively insane, their public expression never gets less astounding. When the Trump-supporting mob stormed the Capitol on Wednesday, the most flabbergasting thing was less that it was happening, than that after four years of dire predictions, our imaginations had still failed to prepare us.
This was, partly, a selectivity of memory. “It can’t happen here” is a phrase that, even as it was used in conjunction with darker warnings about Trump, betrayed a bedrock faith in American democracy that overlooks its savage foundations. The white supremacist project, still going strong as an overt tenet of even liberal government policy well into the 20th century – black Americans were largely cut out of the New Deal – should at least have raised as a possibility a white mob storming the government at the behest of a racist president. The fact that they looked, in their costumes and homemade gas masks, so utterly ridiculous wasn’t even out of keeping with precedent: that end of the extra-political spectrum has always gone in for fancy dress and flaming theatrics.
From a processing point of view, what was stranger, on Wednesday, was that an event with the force of a foregone conclusion still broke a fundamental rule of superstition: that by anticipating the worst, we invite the universe to pleasantly surprise us. The word “coup” has been used in relation to Trump plenty of times since November. Prior to the president’s incitement of the mob, however, it was, even in sincere contexts, used if not as hyperbole, then at least with the expectation that by naming it we lessened the likelihood it would happen. You could take Trump seriously as a threat to national security, believe wholly in his efforts to corrupt the election and still not get fully behind the notion he would encourage a power grab – not just because he is lazy, chaotic and a fool, but because, as an extremely broad principle, nothing ever tends to unfold as predicted.
The day still had to be lived through. As with 9/11 and the beginning of the pandemic, the unreality of Wednesday’s events butted up against quotidian matters to make them seem even more bizarre. It is a function of human resilience that no matter what happens, you still, as Sylvia Plath put it in The Bell Jar, have to “eat three meals a day and have a job and live in the world”. Many of us ditched the job part of that observation and spent the afternoon trying to dispatch our chores while flipping incredulously between news channels; nonetheless life went on. People from other countries texted. I tried to explain what was going on to my children and didn’t get much further than, “You know how Donald Trump’s a terrible person?”
Once again, the goalposts shifted. With each breach of moral standards, Trump has widened the range of public behaviour that can still be absorbed. His supporters smashed windows and graffitied doors and trashed congressional offices, but they were not an armed militia, which, I caught myself thinking, before turning to analyse the thought in amazement, was something to be grateful for. It could have been worse, as those streaming out of the Capitol building shouted to reporters it would be the next time.
In the hallway outside my apartment, my neighbours and I went over how crazy it was, how we couldn’t believe it, what it all meant and where it would go. “It’s Germany 1933,” said one. And whether or not this was true, we all nodded in agreement, then went back inside our homes to make dinner.
Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist More
This article is more than 1 year old Congress certifies Joe Biden as next president hours after storming of Capitol This article is more than 1 year old Trump loyalists objected to certification of election result before session interrupted as mob breached security US politics live – follow the latest news Who are the key […] More
