Top January 6 Investigator: FBI, Other Federal Agencies Could Have Stopped Riot If They Did Their Jobs

Ryan SaavedraJanuary 31, 2023

Chief investigator counsel to the House January 6th committee It was concluded that federal law enforcement officials’ failures played a significant part in the January 6th riot. If those agencies had only acted on the intelligence available, they could have prevented it.

Former federal prosecutor Tim Heaphy revealed His findings were presented to NBC News in an exclusive interview Tuesday by the Democratic-controlled Committee “left out of its televised hearings and final report.”

Heaphy stated that former President Donald Trump was “the proximate cause” For the events that took place on that day “what happened at the Capitol was also affected by law enforcement failures to operationalize the ample intelligence that was present before Jan. 6, about the threats of violence.”

“Law enforcement had a very direct role in contributing to the security failures that led to the violence,” He stated. “There was a lot of advance intelligence about law enforcement, about carrying weapons, about the vulnerability of the Capitol. The intel in advance was pretty specific, and it was enough, in our view, for law enforcement to have done a better job.”

It was noted in the report that the highly politicized commission not only tried to minimize his findings but also went so far as ostracizing him at times. “contradict” His conclusions.

Heaphy stated that the report contained the following conclusions:

The Capitol Police failed to deploy enough force to defend the building, but the FBI and DHS, the federal agencies charged with collecting intelligence about domestic extremists, didn’t do enough to sound the alarm about the threat.The FBI and DHS were too cautious about exploiting so-called “open source” Social media intelligence was gathered out of misplaced concern over free speech violations. The FBI and DHS made a critical error in not publishing a Joint Intelligence Bulletin. This confused the federal agency responsible, which hindered the response to the attack on the Capitol.

Heaphy stated that law enforcement failed to act on tips they received about violence breaking out on that day. These tips were submitted weeks ahead of time.

“Even if individual tips don’t, by themselves, provide enough specific and credible information to take an investigative step, take a step back. If there are 50 such tips, aggregate intelligence suggests, ‘Hey, maybe we have a problem,’” Heaphy added. “That was the failure here.”