Former Capitol Police officers who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, reflected on the attack’s fourth anniversary as Trump prepares to take office for the second time.
Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, who was assaulted by multiple rioters and sustained injuries requiring surgery, blasted MAGA Republicans who he says “turned their backs on police officers who defended them from Trump’s mob.”
“Pardons or not, Republicans in name only, aka MAGA, can’t erase history. They have turned their backs on police officers who defend them from Trump’s mob. The same mob of rioters who they ran for their lives in fear,” Aquilino wrote in a statement shared with MSNBC’s Ana Cabrera.
“These dishonorable elected officials are alive because what officers like myself did, not because of the mob’s lack of trying. They want to rewrite history: Trump and the rioters broke laws and committed crimes. They should not be rewarded,” he added.
Gonnell called on Trump to remember the officers who died by suicide after the riot.
“Remember their names and the colleagues. They paid the ultimate sacrifice and instead of meeting with their families and us, the remaining officers, Republicans have chosen to support and pardon the people who assaulted us. How pathetic is that?” he said.
Gonnell said in an opinion piece published last night in The New York Times that it has been “devastating to me to hear Donald Trump repeat his promise to pardon insurrectionists.” He also called for letting rioters’ convictions stand and wrote that if Trump pardons Jan. 6 defendants, “it could also put me in danger, as I’ve continued to testify in court and I’ve given victim statements in cases against dozens of the rioters who assaulted me and my fellow officers.”
Former Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn said that Trump’s election in November felt like a “gut punch” and that American voters had let down officers who responded to the attack.
“We put our hope in the institutions to stop Trump. (Senate, courts, Supreme Court) they all failed us. The voters did also in November. They sent a message that what happened on January 6 wasn’t a big enough deal to disqualify him. And sadly it just feels like a gut punch,” Dunn said in a text to Cabrera.
