An article circulating on social media alleges that the Marine Corps ‘reprimanded an American speaker, Nancy Pelosi,’ and told her ‘we are not working for you’. This report is false.
The story was first published here on January 13 by Real Raw News (archived version: archive.vn/pHHtn) and has since been repeated on various websites, referring to the publication as the source (here, here, here, here, here, here).
Referring to an alleged ‘Pentagon source who speaks under promise of anonymity’, the article claims that General David H. Berger, commander of the US Marine Corps ( twitter.com/cmc_marinecorps “Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House, refused to use the Corps to protect Biden’s inauguration on January 20 against Trump supporters and insurgents.”
Reuters found no further reports to support this claim, nor any coverage of the alleged exchange. Real Raw News could not be reached for comment at the time of publication of this article.
Capt Casey Littesy, communications strategy and operations officer at Marine Corps headquarters, told Reuters in an email that the article was “blatantly false and inaccurate”.
Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said in an email to Reuters that the article was “false”.
In a joint statement here with top US military leaders, General David H. Berger, condemned the riots in the Capitol and also said that President-elect Joe Biden would be inaugurated on January 20 and become their commander-in-chief (here).
LT Brown, a spokesman for the Joint Task Force – National Capital Region, a joint service order responsible for supporting ceremonial and public affairs for the 59th presidential inauguration, told Reuters by email (here) that Marines assigned to the JTF-NCR units “Provide ceremonial support only”.
The US Secret Service was not immediately available to respond to Reuters’ request for comment regarding any participation by the Marines Corps for security purposes.
After the storms of the American Capitol, the National Guard was authorized to send up to 15,000 troops to Washington (here).
VERDICT
Untrue. According to the respective representatives of the Marine Corps and Nancy Pelosi, an article in which it is alleged that the Marine Corps ‘reprimanded’ US House President Nancy Pelosi is false.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work here.