Final Update!
“Whatever happened to Brian Sicknick was very obviously not the result of violence he suffered at the entrance to the Capitol. This tape overturns the single most powerful and politically useful lie the Democrats have told us about January 6.”
Update (1-8-2023)
Fox News host Tucker Carlson reflects on the January 6 Capitol breach two years later on ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight.’
UPDATE (4-27-2021)
The medical examiner rejected the idea of bear spray being an issue regarding the death of Brian Sicknick. “D.C. Chief Medical Examiner Francisco J. Diaz has determined that Brian Sicknick, the United States Capitol Police officer who died following the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, died of natural causes” (ABC). The WASHINGTON TIMES also notes that “Prosecutors told a federal judge Tuesday that U.S. Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick was assaulted with Mace — not the more dangerous bear spray as originally reported — debunking another false narrative that emerged after the officer’s death the day after the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.” CNBC also notes the following:
- Police officer Brian Sicknick suffered strokes and died of natural causes a day after he grappled with pro-Trump rioters at the Jan. 6 invasion of the U.S. Capitol, Washington’s chief medical examiner ruled.
And finally, THE DAILY WIRE notes the following:
…The New York Times reported on Jan. 8 that two unnamed law enforcement officials said Sicknick died after being hit with a fire extinguisher. House Democrats cited the report as part of its case to impeach Trump on charges that he cited an insurrection at the Capitol.
“The insurrectionists killed a Capitol Police officer by striking him in the head with a fire extinguisher,” the Democrats wrote in a memo for the impeachment proceedings.
There has also been speculation that Sicknick died from a reaction to bear spray that was dispensed at the Capitol. Federal prosecutors charged two men last month with hitting Sicknick and several other police officers with the chemical irritant outside the Capitol.
Diaz’s ruling appears to rule out bear spray as a cause of death….
UPDATE (2-15-2021)
Like so many fake news stories about Donald Trump and his supporters, millions of Americans believe the Sicknick story as truth; even a correction won’t change their minds.
In a quiet but stunning correction, the New York Times backed away from its original report that Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick was killed by a Trump supporter wielding a fire extinguisher during the January 6 melee at the Capitol building. Shortly after American Greatness published my column Friday that showed how the Times gradually was backpedaling on its January 8 bombshell, the paper posted this caveat:
UPDATE: New information has emerged regarding the death of the Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick that questions the initial cause of his death provided by officials close to the Capitol Police.
The paper continued to revise its story within the body of the original January 8 story: “Law enforcement officials initially said Mr. Sicknick was struck with a fire extinguisher, but weeks later, police sources and investigators were at odds over whether he was hit. Medical experts have said he did not die of blunt force trauma, according to one law enforcement official.”
What’s missing, however, is how the Times first described what happened to Sicknick. “Mr. Sicknick, 42, an officer for the Capitol Police, died on Thursday from brain injuries he sustained after Trump loyalists who overtook the complex struck him in the head with a fire extinguisher, according to two law enforcement officials.”
The account of Sicknick’s death was reported as fact, not speculation or rumor. Further, it appears that the anonymous sources were not law enforcement officials but people “close” to the police department—which means they could have been anyone from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to inveterate liar U.S. Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) to the Democratic mayor of Washington, D.C., Muriel Bowser.
Not only was the Times’ untrue story about Sicknick’s death accepted as fact by every news media organization from the Wall Street Journal to the Washington Post, political pundits on the NeverTrump Right also regurgitated the narrative that Sicknick was “murdered” as did lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
[….]
*The Times’ correction might be one reason why Democrats on Saturday reversed their demand to subpoena witnesses. House impeachment managers cited the original January 8 Times’ article as evidence in their impeachment memo: “The insurrectionists killed a Capitol Police officer by striking him in the head with a fire extinguisher.”
Any arrangement to compel testimony would have provided Trump’s legal team with an opportunity to expose yet another myth in the Democrats’ “incitement” case against the former president.
Now that the Times has essentially retracted its explosive article, will other news organizations, pundits, and lawmakers follow suit? Unfortunately, like so many media-manufactured stories about Donald Trump and his supporters, millions of Americans already believe the Sicknick story as truth; even a Times’ correction won’t change their minds.
The truth in all matters related to Donald Trump is only of secondary concern, if at all. And once again, reporters who egregiously exploited a man’s untimely death to score political points against a man they revile won’t be held accountable. Another hoax down the memory hole.
I, like other conservative outlets, believed this story. I linked to RIGHT SCOOP regarding the story and agreed (and still do — if the story was true — not just in this situation):
- I hope they have on video exactly who hit this brave officer with a fire extinguisher and prosecute them for murder. This cannot go unpunished.
*ANOTHER REASON WHY NO WITNESSES CALLED
RPT NOTE: As well as the first witness called would have been Nancy Pelosi, who was IN CHARGE of Capitol Hill security… the Buck didn’t stop with her apparently…. the DEMS couldn’t afford the narrative to break!
GATEWAY PUNDIT notes the “moving on” timeline:
It is well known that Pelosi, Bowser and Mitch McConnell refused to increase security on January 6th for the US Capitol.
Senator Ted Cruz agreed this morning that the Trump legal team will call in Speaker Pelosi to testify along with Mayor Muriel Bowser.
Following this announcement, the House Impeachment Managers backed off from calling witnesses.
They moved on to closing arguments.
REMEMBER AS WELL
Mark Levin discusses Mark Meadows revelation from February 7th (TRUMP WAR ROOM). I do not listen to Mark all that much, but this is the maddest I have heard him (at the end: 6:03 to 6:15 mark).
…Meadows told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo that even though Trump was vocal about offering Capitol Police and National Guard presence at the Capitol on multiple occasions prior to January 6, his offers were rejected “every time.”
“We also know that in January, but also throughout the summer, that the president was very vocal in making sure that we had plenty of National Guard, plenty of additional support because he supports our rule of law and supports our law enforcement and offered additional help,” Meadows told Bartiromo.
“Even in January, that was a given, as many as 10,000 National Guard troops were told to be on the ready by the Secretary of Defense,” Meadows said. “That was a direct order from President Trump and yet here is what we see … all kinds of blame going around but yet not a whole lot of accountability.”…
What is not known by the typical cable news watcher, probably, is that both the Capital Police and the mayor of D.C. turned down offers to help secure the government areas before and as the mob of crazed Lefties and Righties descended on the Capital:
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- …Three days before the riot, the Pentagon offered National Guard manpower. And as the mob descended on the building Wednesday, Justice Department leaders reached out to offer up FBI agents. Capitol Police turned them down both times, according to senior defense officials and two people familiar with the matter. Despite plenty of warnings of a possible insurrection and ample resources and time to prepare, police planned only for a free speech demonstration. (WASHINGTON TIMES)
- Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser told federal law enforcement to stand down just one day before a mob of Trump supporters breached the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, smashing windows, entering the chambers, and forcing lawmakers and congressional staff inside into lockdown. “To be clear, the District of Columbia is not requesting other federal law enforcement personnel and discourages any additional deployment without immediate notification to, and consultation with, MPD if such plans are underway,” Bowser wrote in a letter to acting U.S. Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller, and Secretary of the Army Ryan D. McCarthy. According to Bowser, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department in coordination with the U.S. Park Police, Capitol Police, and Secret Sevice were well-equipped to handle whatever problems could come up during the Trump rallies planned for Wednesday. (THE FEDERALIST)
FIRST POST (2-10-2021)
(RIGHT SCOOP) At the open of his show tonight, Tucker Carlson had a great monologue about the lies Democrats are telling about what happened on January 6th… The monologue runs for just over 12 minutes, but you can keep watching if you want (HERE). The part I wanted to highlight specifically is what Tucker reported about Officer Sicknick’s death. It was reported widely that Sicknick was hit in the head with a fire extinguisher by a rioter and that he later died. But according to Tucker, that’s not what happened:
In this short clip, Tucker reveals that Sicknick’s own brother said that Sicknick texted him the night of the Capitol riot, after it was over, and said that he’d been pepper sprayed twice but was in good shape. His brother then noted that Sicknick collapsed in the Capitol and that he was resuscitated with CPR. The family was told that he was in the hospital on a ventilator after having had a blood clot and a stroke.
Tucker says that there is zero evidence that Sicknick was ever ‘bludgeoned’ with a fire extinguisher despite CNN, MSNBC, and other major media outlets having reported it. And Democrats are still saying it….
(BTW, I hope every rioter in these scenes is arrested. But this is the only fire extinguisher video [1:40 mark] I could find)
This is not the entire article… and I suggest reading the entire thing… however, I wish to post part of it here as i think it important (AMERICAN GREATNESS):
What Happened to Officer Brian Sicknick? No one should discount the idea that Democrats and the news media would intentionally promote a totally fabricated story to destroy Donald Trump and vilify his supporters.
The claim is so pervasive as not to be questioned: Five people died as a result of the January 6 “insurrection” at the Capitol building, killed by blood-thirsty Trump voters at the president’s behest, out for revenge over a stolen election.
Even though only one death—the shooting of Ashli Babbitt by a still-unidentified police officer—is provable by video evidence, the other fatalities nonetheless are accepted as an article of faith to stoke public outrage about what happened that day.
[….]
NARRATIVE vs. EVIDENCE
Democrats wasted no time exploiting Sicknick’s untimely death. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) immediately ordered flags flown at half-staff at the Capitol; news and opinion outlets on both the Left and NeverTrump Right blamed the so-called “insurrectionists” for killing Sicknick.
National Review claimed, without evidence, that Sicknick was “murdered.” The president and his allies in the Senate, pundits raged, were accomplices. “When he told followers to ‘STAND UP,’ they listened and murdered a cop while storming the Capitol,” one Washington Examiner writer tweeted about the role of Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). “Make him pay.”
Lawmakers of both parties paid their respects to Sicknick last week during a rare Capitol ceremony; his body lay in honor in the Rotunda on February 3 following a brief memorial service. When Joe Biden and his wife walked away from the display, the president shook his head in grief.
The widely-accepted circumstances surrounding Sicknick’s death are part of the Democrats’ impeachment crusade against Donald Trump. “The insurrectionists killed a Capitol Police officer by striking him in the head with a fire extinguisher,” House impeachment managers allege in a memorandum detailing their evidence.
But that inflammatory accusation isn’t backed by an autopsy report or any hard evidence such as a video clip. It isn’t backed by charging documents filed against anyone suspected of killing Sicknick; nearly five weeks later, no one has been accused of murdering the officer even though federal law enforcement officials have arrested more than 200 people tied to their involvement in the January 6 melee.
No, the only proof the House impeachment managers can find is the January 8, New York Times article that relied not on evidence but on background from “two law enforcement officials.”
STRUGGLING TO BUILD A CASE
If Sicknick is the face representing the carnage of January 6, Democrats are at risk of losing their most compelling sympathy storyline just as the impeachment trial gets underway.
“Investigators are struggling to build a federal murder case regarding fallen U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, vexed by a lack of evidence that could prove someone caused his death,” CNN disclosed last week. “Authorities have reviewed video and photographs that show Sicknick engaging with rioters amid the siege but have yet to identify a moment in which he suffered his fatal injuries.”
A medical examiner’s report has not been released and law enforcement authorities are tight-lipped; in a January 26 email to me, an FBI spokeswoman refused to comment on the status of the investigation. The District of Columbia medical examiner’s office told me Monday by email they “will release the cause and manner of death when this information is available.”
Sources, however, told CNN that the medical examiner “did not find signs that the officer sustained any blunt force trauma . . . and early reports that he was fatally struck by a fire extinguisher are not true.” Investigators also couldn’t confirm that Sicknick died as a result of reaction to pepper spray.
Messaging from the FBI does little to inspire trust in the Sicknick storyline. The agency at first issued a statement that claimed 37 suspects were under investigation for the officer’s death but later said the statement was in error and relied on “incorrect internal information.”
During a January 12 press briefing on its sweeping investigation into the events of January 6, the assistant director for the FBI’s D.C. field office twice referred to Sicknick as having “passed away,” with no mention of his having been “murdered” or “killed.” A distinction, in this matter, with a big difference.
WILL OPTICS TRUMP THE TRUTH
Comments from Sicknick’s family also raise legitimate suspicions about what happened to their loved one.
“Many details regarding Wednesday’s events and the direct causes of Brian’s injuries remain unknown, and our family asks the public and the press to respect our wishes in not making Brian’s passing a political issue,” his older brother wrote in a statement released January 8.
[….]
The more likely explanation is that Sicknick wasn’t murdered but died of other causes that neither law enforcement nor the family wants made public. It’s certainly the family’s prerogative to keep it secret; it is not, however, acceptable for the FBI to continue avoiding questions while at the same time feeding the public a false account of what happened to him. And since the medical examiner’s office hadn’t confirmed the cause of death, it’s beyond irresponsible for anyone, particularly a reporter, to describe it as murder…..