US Capitol Police Have a Message for Would-be Insurrectionists 2.0

"Don't even think about it."

A new U.S. Capitol Police recruiting poster at a bus stop near a Metro station in Washington, DC. (Photo credit: Barry Piatt)

New recruiting posters for the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) force appear to be sending a not so subtle - and tough - message to any Donald Trump supporters who may be thinking about launching another violent attack on the US Capitol if Donald Trump loses the 2024 presidential: “Don’t even think about it.”

The new recruiting posters are showing up around Washington, DC, at bus stops and other high traffic areas.

The posters, pictured above, feature a full color photo of the U.S. Capitol, its broad, beautiful green lawn, and a USCP officer dressed for war - at least outfitted in such a way that he’d fit in at any military hotspot around the world where US troops are deployed, right down to the military style rifle in hand.

It’s not hard to understand why an image like this is being used.

On January 6, 2021, Trump supporters - egged on by Trump himself - attacked the US Capitol in an attempted insurrection which sought to stop the counting of the electoral ballots and over turn the democratic election of Joe Biden as President of the United States.

Nine Iowans were charged and either convicted or pled guilty to felonies for crimes committed that day at the Capitol. They were among more than 1,200 other people similarly charged, many of whom have also pled guilty or been convicted.

The attack was the most violent attack on the US Capitol since August 24 and August 25, 1814, during the war of 1812 when both the White House and the Capitol were burned and ransacked by the British.

During the 2021 attack, one USCP officer was killed defending the Capitol and four others committed suicide within seven months. A total of 174 officers were injured, many seriously. Damage from the attack to the Capitol and police equipment totaled $2.9 million.

Iowa Republicans apparently don’t think any of that was a very big deal.

Iowa’s two senators - Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Joni Ernst (R-IA) - voted on May 21, 2021, to block Senate consideration of legislation that would have established a bi-partisan, independent commission to investigate the attempted January 6 coup.

Iowa’s Republicans in the US House at that time - Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-1st IA), Ashley Hinson (R-2nd IA), Randy Feenstra (R-4th IA) - voted on June 30, 2021, against establishing the bi-partisan House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Iowa’s lone Democrat in Congress at the time, Cindy Axne (D-), voted for the special committee to investigate the attempted coup.

On February 4, 2022, the Republican National Committee (RNC) passed a resolution formally describing the violent attack on the Capitol - and on the democratic process the insurrectionists were trying to stop - as “legitimate political discourse.”

Iowa Republicans in the House and Senate did not actively or directly disagree with the RNC’s characterization of the violent attack as “legitimate political discourse.”

While the RNC and Iowa Republicans in Congress would apparently like people to believe the attempted coup on January 6, 2021 was no big deal - certainly not worth formally investigating - or even that it was “legitimate political discourse,” it is clear that three and a half years later, the USCP - the law enforcement organization with responsibility for protecting the US Capitol, the people who work there, and the democratic processes which take place there - has a very different view of what happened on January 6 - and doesn’t intend to let it happen again.

What is not hard to see is the broader, deeper message the USCP poster is delivering: a warning to any Trump supporter out there thinking about - or in town to plan - another violent attack on the Capitol to stop the formal certification of the election of Vice President Kamala Harris as President, if Trump loses the general election again, an increasing possibility.

The USCP poster’s message seems to be, on a deeper level, a warning that the USCP will be ready and waiting for anyone who thinks about launching another violent attack on the Capitol following another Donald Trump general election loss and shows up to try it.

The USCP’s response to any such attempted repeat attack, as the old saying goes, is not going to be “bean bag.”

In all the years I worked on Capitol Hill - arriving with a freshly minted Iowa Congressman Tom Harkin (D-IA) in 1975 - I never once saw a US Capitol Police officer dressed and equipped like the officer pictured on the recruiting poster. Not even when Presidents of the United States or foreign heads of state visited Capitol Hill.

Yet, this is the imge the USCP is now using to draw in new recruits.

I think the real mission of this poster - and its image which is startling when first encountered - is three fold:

• Yes, they’d like to bolster the force by hiring some additional officers. The poster aims to draw in some recruits and bolster the ranks. As advertised.

• Deterrence. It’s a show of force. They are putting the word out indirectly but early and hard to any of the MAGA gang who may be in town to lay the groundwork for another attempted coup if Trump loses the 2024 election: a Capitol Police response is going to be very different if there is an Insurrection 2.0 attack.

• The USCP is letting potential recruits know what they are getting into. The job - which has always come with great risk - has changed. Being a Capitol Police officer has always been a job that comes with danger. The officers injured and killed on January 6, 2021 were not the first USCP on-the-job casualties, and likely won’t be the last. Guarding against those threats and dangers is likely to be an even bigger part of the job going forward, and USCP officers need to expect to be tasked with combating those threats and dangers - especially in the immediate aftermath of another Trump general election loss, and especially as he continues to refuse to commit to accepting the election results if he loses. His violent supporters - who he encourages - have had the opportunity to stress test their insurrection plans, and four years to tweak a new coup attempt based on lessons learned from the first one.

As someone who spent decades working on the Hill, it makes me sad to see that such a recruiting poster is now in use, even more sad that one like it is necessary.

I understand completely why it is necessary, and why the USCP has to be ready to confront a violent MAGA mob once again if it comes to that. I sincerely hope that it won’t. But the fact that we even have to worry that it might, plan for it, and be ready for it, is more evidence of what Donald Trump’s ugly, lasting legacy will really be in American history.

The specter of political violence, now a continuing possibility in the aftermath of elections that don’t go the way the MAGA gang wants, is just one more thing in America that Donald Trump has corrupted. The peaceful transfer of power through democratic elections used to be one of the things that truly made America great and the envy of the world.

Donald Trump destroyed that tradition and threatens it still.

The USCP is sending the right message.

The RNC and Iowa’s Republicans in Congress are still wrong about the January 6. They do not serve democracy by continuing to minimize the attempted coup that went down that day or by ignoring Trump’s refusal to commit to accepting election results in 2024 if he loses, a subject on which they have meekly said nothing.

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