How to Prevent Jan. 6th
Volume VI • Edition I
March 2021
1
counting of the electoral votes would occur, would require extra security personOn January 6, 2021, Americans nel on January 6th. Thus, stricter surveilthroughout the nation gazed at their tele- lance laws to gather more detailed public visions in fear and distress as they witinformation would not have prevented nessed one of the most egregious attacks the failure to recognize the magnitude of on federal property in recent memory. the attack. Although this insurrection on the United In fact, it can be clearly inferred States Capitol represented a horrifying that if governmental officials had done breach of a supposedly secured buildonly a basic amount of research regarding, presenting a major threat to elected ing the event, they could have deployed Congressmen and governmental officials, extra and adequate personnel. For examthe events of that day do not warrant new ple, despite lacking one singular leader or stricter domestic surveillance laws on such as the President and being planned the American public. Rather, in examin- only a few days prior, governmental ofing the intelligence failures of the insur- ficials had no problem deciphering when rection, the only plausible modification and where Black Lives Matter protests in legislation should be in considering would occur. During these protests, whether to redistribute the power to de- which were much more frequent and ploy state and federal troops. numerous, and thus should have each reDespite the insurrection initially ceived less individual attention from the seeming like a secret and well coordinat- federal government, state and federal ed event, no detailed surveillance beyond officials were able to adequately prepare what would be accessible by any ordinary for and deploy extra security personnel citizen was necessary to predict and fors- in each state. However, in the attack of ee the potential magnitude of the attack. the Capitol, which was much more preIn fact, any individual throughout the dictable by being promoted on numerous United States with an electronic device social media platforms over the course of and access to social media platforms could multiple months by even the most promhave witnessed the numerous tweets and inent individual in the nation himself, posts foreshadowing the event. On multi- governmental officials were strangely ple occasions throughout the months and unable to adequately prepare. days prior to the attack, President Trump Furthermore, neither a lack of on his public Twitter account announced governmental insight nor an inability to that he expected a large crowd of supadequately deploy troops were the cause porters to gather in Washington DC on of the security failure. Rather, one major January 6th just a walking distance away reason that the Capitol was unprepared from the Capitol. Additionally, Trump for the attack pertains to the distribuon numerous occasions even retweeted tion of power to deploy troops in DC and statements from his supporters who de- on federal grounds. As opposed to most scribed in militaristic terms that a “caval- states, in which the governors essentially ry” of the President’s presumably violent have the power to deploy the national supporters would arrive there according guard, since DC is not considered a state, to his lead. Furthermore, just by following any request from the mayor of DC to this simple trail of the President and his deploy the district’s national guard must supporters’ tweets, any ordinary Ameri- pass through multiple layers of presiden-
The Podium | Op-Ed Winners
Author- Daniel Bittner ’22 can could quickly discover that at a minSection-Op-ed Winners imum the Capitol building, in which the
