Two and a half weeks later, Gosar repeated unfounded allegations about stolen ballot papers and fraudulent voting machines in a speech to Congress when he was interrupted by chaos on the House floor. Within minutes, lawmakers were evacuated as rioters advanced through the heart of American democracy – spurred on by the same rhetoric advocated by Gosar and some of his fellow Republicans.
The first part of Gosar’s prophecy has at least come true: Capitol Hill has been conquered.
The uprising last week in which five people were killed, including a police officer in the Capitol, spurred a new step to accuse President Donald Trump and a wave of criticism of the most prominent senators who voted for President Bide’s election to block victory. But Gosar and several other of his GOP colleagues in the House are also facing hours before the siege before new investigation for their arson.
One of the movement’s top organizers, who was aiming to block the election results, claimed he was working closely with Republican lawmakers. Ali Alexander, a leader of the “Stop the Steal” group, said in several livestream videos from Periscope last month that he was planning the rally that preceded the riot in collaboration with Gosar and two other congressional Republicans, Mo Brooks of Alabama and Andy Biggs of Arizona. , as CNN first reported last week.
“We’re the four guys who came up with a January 6 meeting,” Alexander said in a December video. “It was to build momentum and pressure and then on the day to change the hearts and minds of people of Congress who have not yet decided whether or not everyone has seen outside and said, ‘I can not be on the other side of be the mob. ‘
Brooks, a staunch Conservative and one of Trump’s closest congressmen, was one of the first speakers at the National Mall rally to precede the riot, and his fiery language helped set the tone for what followed.
“This is the day today that American patriots start taking pictures and kicking!” shouted the six-term Republican for the assembled protesters. “Our ancestors sacrificed their blood, their sweat, their tears, their fate and sometimes their lives … Are you willing to do the same?”
Hours later, as some of the same people Brooks spoke to smashed windows at the U.S. Capitol, the legislature rang as he and his colleagues were evacuated from the living rooms.
‘Tear gas dispersed in Capitol Rotunda,’ Brooks
wrote in a tweet posted from his iPad. “Congressmen ordered to grab gas masks under chairs if they had to leave in a hurry!”
Brooks was the first member of Congress to say publicly that he would object to the certification of Biden’s election votes. The day before the rally on January 6, he
tweeted that Trump “personally asked me to speak up and tell the American people about the weakness of the electoral system that the Socialist Democrats exploited to steal this election.”
After the uprising, while Brooks condemned and
called for them to be ‘prosecuted to the full extent of the law’, he also repeatedly suggested on social media and in interviews that at least some of the people who stormed the Capitol were members of the left-wing group Antifa – a unfounded claim that was widely rejected.
Like Trump, who said Tuesday that his remarks during the rally, when he urged supporters to “fight like hell”, were “completely appropriate”, Brooks denied responsibility for the riot and the day after the attack for a radio program presenter said “absolutely” had no regrets.
He later said in a statement on Tuesday that his remarks could not be the cause of the violence. “No one during the rally interpreted my remarks as anything other than what they were: a pep talk after the kicking Conservative kick in the sad election in 2020,” Brooks wrote.
Gosar has been associated with the Stop the Steal movement for months. He has tagged or responded to Alexander in more than two dozen tweets since election day, with false rumors about mysterious ballots and the election of votes and speaking at the Dec. 19 meeting in the Arizona capital that Alexander arranged. He wrote an online open letter last month entitled “Are we witnessing a coup?”
“Prayer must yield,” Gosar
tweeted on the morning of last week’s congressional vote, shares a photo of the pro-Trump protesters who gathered in front of the Washington Monument. ‘I want his concession on my desk tomorrow morning. Do not let me get there. ‘
While the uprising was still going on, Gosar shared divergent messages about the rioters.
In a tweet with a photo of people scaling down the walls of the Capitol, Gosar wrote “let’s not get carried away here”, adding that “if anyone on the ground reads it and is out of line, come back.” But on the right-wing social media network Parler, which has since gone offline, Gosar posted the same image with a different caption: “Americans are upset.”
Even Gosar’s relatives say his language has gone too far. Several of his siblings – who recorded a viral campaign ad for one of his opponents in 2018 – argued that he should resign or be removed.
“My brother swore an oath to defend the Constitution against foreign and domestic enemies,” Congressman’s younger brother Tim Gosar, a private investigator in Fort Collins, Colorado, told CNN this week. “And he blatantly broke that oath.”
Gosar’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
At the Arizona Stop the Steal rally with Gosar, Alexander played a video that he said Biggs, the chairman of the conservative Freedom Caucus, sent to the crowd.
“Andy Biggs here,” the Arizona congressman said in the survey. “I wish I could be with you. I’m in the DC swamp and fighting on behalf of Arizona residents and freedom fighters across the country.” The crowd responds with a chant of ‘Biggs! Biggs! Biggs! ‘ The Republic of Arizona reported the video for the first time Monday.
A Biggs spokesman told CNN that the congressman recorded the video at the request of Gosar’s staff and never worked with Alexander.
“Congressman Biggs is not at any stage aware of the hearing or meeting with Alexander.” He had no contact with protesters or rioters, nor did he encourage or promote the protest or protests. “
Biggs was one of several Republican members of Congress who
refused to wear masks in a safe room where lawmakers were housed during the riot, according to a video posted by congressional news website Punchbowl. Several Democratic members have said in recent days that they tested positive for Covid after being in the room.
Other Republicans in Congress also painted their efforts to oppose Biden’s victory in a comprehensive, historical term. In the days before the riot, first-year camp Laura Boebert of Colorado and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia both called Wednesday’s election certificate a ‘1776 moment.’
Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, another newly elected member, said at the same meeting as Brooks and Trump that Republicans are hiding and not fighting and that they are trying to silence your voice.
“I want you to sing with me so loud that the cowards in Washington DC I serve can hear you,” he declared.
A Cawthorn spokesman said the congressman condemned the violence during the riot and criticized Trump for “directing protesters to the Capitol.”
Two Democrats have passed a resolution condemning Brooks for his comments during the protest, while others have argued that they have expelled Gosar and other Republicans from Congress who are trying to overthrow the election. Democratic leaders have not yet devised plans to vote on a no-confidence motion, but the issue has been repeatedly discussed during private conference calls, Democratic sources say.
“Mo Brooks and others like him should resign,” Rep. Jim McGovern, a Democratic Massachusetts man, told CNN Monday. “They must have the decency to resign. They do not belong to this institution. They have shown contempt for democracy and freedom.”
Denver Riggleman, a moderate Republican who lost his primary nomination to a more conservative challenger last year, said he thinks GOP leaders should have a “come to Jesus” moment and the congressmen who are on fire of the insurgent, must hold responsible. But he said he doubted GOP members would punish members like Gosar or Brooks if they were on the ballot again.
“The elected officials are likely to be re-elected, and that is the problem we currently have,” Riggleman said. “I think that’s what scares me the most.”
CNN’s Nelli Black, Yahya Abou-Ghazala, Ben Naughton, Bob Ortega contributed to this report.
