A year after Capitol attack, familiar falsehoods persist

When a mob loyal to former President Donald Trump forcibly overtook the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, conservative bloggers and social media commentators scrambled to fabricate a different story: that the day was nonviolent, a false flag by Democrats or the brainchild of undercover federal officials.

A year later, thousands on social media echoed those falsehoods on Thursday in their attempts to minimize the day’s events and deflect blame from Trump supporters.

As President Joe Biden spoke on the anniversary of the insurrection accusing Trump and his supporters of holding “a dagger at the throat of democracy,” social media posts amassing thousands of views repeated false claims that the rioters were peaceful tourists, that the FBI planned the attack and that the 2020 election was the “real insurrection.”

Here’s a closer look at the facts.

CLAIM: The rioters weren’t Trump supporters.

THE FACTS: Many of those who came to the Capitol on Jan. 6 have said — proudly, publicly and repeatedly — that they did so to help the then-president.

But different versions of this false claim suggest they were instead FBI operatives, members of the anti-fascist movement antifa or a mixture of other groups besides Trump backers.

“It was a legal protest that was turned into a riot by the FBI punks antifa and black lives matter devils posing as Trump supporters,” read one widely circulating Facebook post on Thursday.

Hundreds of Twitter users shared the hashtag #Fedsurrection on Thursday, a nod to Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz’s disputed claim in a press conference that FBI officials posing undercover as Trump supporters could have orchestrated the attack.

In reality, the evidence indicates that the pro-Trump protesters who rioted that day were just who they said they were.

An Associated Press review of social media posts, voter registrations, court files and other public records for more than 120 people either facing criminal charges or identified in footage from Jan. 6 showed that the mob was overwhelmingly made up of longtime Trump supporters. They included GOP officials and donors, far-right militants, white supremacists, off-duty police, members of the military and conspiracy theory adherents.

One rioter was a newly elected state lawmaker from West Virginia, a Republican Trump supporter named Derrick Evans who resigned following his arrest. Evans streamed video of himself illegally entering the Capitol.

In the days after the insurrection, the AP debunked multiple claims that specific rioters who stormed the Capitol were antifa activists, confirming one was a Trump supporter and another had been wrongly associated with an antifa group.

During testimony before Congress, FBI Director Christopher Wray was asked whether there was any reason to believe the insurrection was organized by “fake Trump protesters.”

“We have not seen evidence of that,” said Wray, who was appointed by Trump.

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CLAIM: The rioters weren’t violent.

THE FACTS: Yes they were, as photos and videos gathered by the AP show.

AP journalists on the scene captured the chaos, violence and aftermath of the insurrection, including physical confrontations between protesters and police, some shoving and hitting officers with objects, as well as an assault on an AP photographer in the crowd.

The rioters who broke into the Capitol smashed windows, broke through barricades and attacked law enforcement. Some brandished weapons; others wore tactical gear. Some chanted “Hang Mike Pence!” after the then-vice president said he did not have the power to unilaterally overturn Biden’s win.

Dozens of police officers were severely injured. One Capitol Police officer who was attacked and assaulted with bear spray suffered a stroke and died a day later of natural causes. In all, at least nine people who were there that day died during and after the rioting, including a woman who was shot and killed by police as she tried to break into the House chamber.

Former Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, who rushed to the scene, said he was “grabbed, beaten, tased, all while being called a traitor to my country.” The assault stopped only when he said he had children.

Rioters broke into the Senate chamber minutes after senators had fled under armed protection. They rifled through desks and lookedfor lawmakers, yelling, “Where are they?” In Pelosi’s office, staffers hid under desks while rioters called out the name of the California Democrat.

In addition to the injuries and deaths, rioters caused an estimated $1.5 million in damage, leaving piles of shattered glass and destroyed property in their wake.

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CLAIM: There wasn’t an “insurrection,” it was a protest that got out of hand.

THE FACTS: What happened on Jan. 6 was much more than a protest.

That day, fueled by lies spread by Trump and his allies that the results of the election could somehow be overturned, hundreds of his supporters mobbed the Capitol with a purpose: to halt the congressional certification of Biden’s victory.

Attackers rose up physically and violently against the established authorities — Congress, as it was carrying out its constitutional duties, surrounded and protected by U.S. government staff and police. Many in the siege were intent on stopping Congress from affirming Trump’s defeat.

Under the U.S. criminal code, the crime of insurrection is committed by “Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto.”

Apart from the law and legal texts, insurrection is defined by Webster’s New World College Dictionary, which is used by The Associated Press, as “a rising up against established authority; rebellion; revolt.”

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CLAIM: Election Day 2020 was the real insurrection.

THE FACTS: There was no insurrection on Election Day. There was a free and fair election won by Biden.

Despite Trump’s repeated claims, no evidence of widespread corruption has ever been found. Every state has certified its results as fair and accurate, and numerous state and federal election officials — including Trump’s own attorney general at the time — have said there was no evidence of systemic fraud or errors of a scale that could have possibly changed the outcome.

Judges have widely agreed, even some appointed by Trump. The government’s then-top cybersecurity and election officials declared the election “the most secure in American history” with “no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.”

Biden won by the same Electoral College margin that Trump did in 2016. Unlike Trump in 2016, Biden won the popular vote, getting 7 million-plus more votes than Trump.

And an AP review of every potential case of voter fraud in the six battleground states disputed by Trump found that there was far too little fraud to tip the election to Trump. Fewer than 475 cases were documented — a number that would have made no difference in the 2020 presidential election.

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Associated Press journalists Ali Swenson, Christina A. Cassidy, Jill Colvin, David Klepper and Calvin Woodward contributed to this report.

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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.