By Christine Rosen
Friday, January 08, 2021
President-Elect Joe Biden’s initial response to the insurrectionary violence on Capitol Hill on January 6 was strong
and steadying. He condemned the violence and said President Trump should
denounce it publicly. In stark contrast to Trump’s behavior, Biden did what a
political leader should do at a time of national crisis: Project calm and call
for a de-escalation of tensions.
But the next day, his message had shifted. “No one can
tell me that if it had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting
yesterday,” Biden said, “they wouldn’t have been treated very, very differently
than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol. We all know that’s true, and it
is unacceptable.”
Vice President-elect Kamala Harris repeated the
spurious claim. “We have witnessed two systems of justice,” she said. “One that let extremists storm the U.S. Capitol yesterday, and another
that released tear gas on peaceful protestors last summer. It’s simply
unacceptable.”
It is the narrative around which the incoming Biden
administration and its media allies are coalescing. Biden’s nominee to lead the
Department of Housing and Urban Development, Marcia Fudge, told USA Today, “The Capitol
police were unprepared, ineffective and some were complicit. All of them should
be held to account.” She added that there’s “no question” the response was
different than at last year’s Black Lives Matter protests at the Capitol.
“There is a double standard,” Fudge concluded.
Biden and Harris won the White House with a bland but
ultimately compelling political message, in contrast to the turmoil of the
Trump years: Reunify the country. It says something worrisome about their
political priorities that, at a moment when unity is most needed, they chose to
highlight racial division.
Worse, in taking this course, Biden also promoted a
false narrative about law enforcement. By issuing this vague and hypothetical
indictment, Biden advanced an article of faith among progressive activists that
all cops are motivated by anti-black animus, and that the Capitol Police would
have reacted more harshly had the mob been composed of minorities. The events
of January 6 as we currently understand them suggest otherwise.
Amid Wednesday’s siege of the Capitol, police ended up
shooting and killing one protestor (a white woman) and have so far arrested
nearly 70 more. More arrests are likely, since law enforcement captured clear
footage of the perpetrators. Three other protestors died as a result of medical
emergencies.
Contra Kamala Harris, the police did deploy tear gas to stop the mob. According to reports, as many
as 60 Capitol Police officers were injured and 15 were hospitalized after
engaging in hostilities with and being overwhelmed by the mob. Tragically, one
Capitol Hill police officer, Brian Sicknick, died after sustaining injuries in
the line of duty.
Compare this to the months of riots and demonstrations
after the killing of George Floyd. During that time, dozens of people were killed in the rioting but only one protestor died at the
hands of law enforcement. As well, only a tiny fraction of those responsible
for violence and looting were arrested, and many of them eventually saw their
charges dropped.
In the two-night melee of rioting and looting in
Minnesota this summer, for example, only 45 people total were arrested. VP-elect Harris even called on Americans to donate money to bail them
out; the money ended up allowing rapists and other violent felons to escape jail time. This happened in cities all over the country.
If our justice system were as biased and reflexively
punitive as Biden and Harris claim, the people whose wanton destruction of
their communities led to numerous deaths and billions of dollars in property
damage wouldn’t have walked free.
On January 6, a combination of factors led to
disaster. Trump was derelict in his charge by failing to have National Guard
troops present in force in the District, yes. But Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel
Bowser’s insistence that no additional federal law
enforcement presence in the city was necessary meant that the law enforcement
personnel were going to be outnumbered if the long-planned demonstration turned
violent. If systemic racism is to blame for how the mob was treated, where do
the actions of D.C.’s Democratic, African-American mayor fit into that
equation?
Unlike many Democrats, candidate Joe Biden strongly
condemned the violence and destruction that occurred over the summer. Which is
why it is odd to see him parroting BLM talking points now.
The reason the events at the Capitol on January 6 were
so horrifying is that it was an attack (encouraged by a sitting president) on
our government—a government that represents all of the people, and which was in
the middle of certifying an election. An overwhelmed and underprepared team of
law enforcement officers did the best they could to control the mob, and one
lost his life in the process.
There can be no doubt there was a racist element to
these protests. If the waving of Confederate flags and the horrifically racist
and anti-Semitic garb worn by some in the mob are any indication, some of the
animosity that fueled them is grounded in white nationalist ideology. That is
reprehensible and should be thoroughly condemned—a task that, unfortunately,
not all elected officials seem capable of doing. But it would be a mistake to
try to marginalize those who seek racial division by encouraging racial
division.
Trump’s “stop the steal” incitement to violence was a
degradation, one for which he should pay with impeachment and removal during
his last days in office. For Biden and Harris to use this moment to double down
on misguided, racially divisive ideology rather than encouraging the country to
come together is not just worrisome. It is an example of poor leadership when
leadership is what is needed most.
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