The attackJanuary 6 United States Capitol attack had political, legal, and social repercussions. The second impeachment of Donald Trump, who was charged for incitement of insurrection for his conduct, occurred on January 13. At the same time, Cabinet officials were pressured to invoke the 25th Amendment for removing Trump from office. Trump was subsequently acquitted in the Senate trial, which was held in February after Trump had already left office. The result was a 57–43 vote in favor of conviction, with every Democrat and seven Republicans voting to convict, but two-thirds of the Senate (67 votes) are required to convict. Many in the Trump administration resigned. Several large companies (updated) announced they were halting all political donations, and others have suspended funding the lawmakers who had objected to certifying Electoral College results. A bill was introduced to form an independent commission, similar to the 9/11 Commission, to investigate the events surrounding the attack; it passed the House but was blocked by Republicans in the Senate. The House then approved a House "select committee" to investigate the attack. In June, the Senate released the results of its own investigation of the attack. The event led to strong criticism of law enforcement agencies. Leading figures within the United States Capitol Police resigned. A large-scale criminal investigation was undertaken, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) opening more than 1,200 case files. Federal law enforcement undertook a nationwide manhunt for the perpetrators, with arrests and indictments following within days. Over 890 people had been found guilty of federal crimes.
Trump was suspended from various social media sites for his involvement in inciting the attack, at first temporarily and then indefinitely. In response to posts by Trump supporters in favour of the attempts to overturn the election, the social networking site Parler was shut down by its service providers. Corporate suspensions of other accounts and programs associated with participating groups also took place.
The inauguration week was marked by nationwide security concerns. Unprecedented security preparations for the inauguration of Joe Biden were undertaken, including the deployment of 25,000 National Guard members. In May, the House passed a $1.9 billion Capitol security bill in response to the attack.
In the days following the attack on the Capitol, Republican politicians in at least three states introduced legislation creating new prohibitions on protest activity.
Trump has publicly embraced and celebrated the January 6 Capitol attack. Trump and elected officials within the Republican Party have since promoted a revisionist history of the event by downplaying the severity of the violence, spread conspiracy theories about the attack, called those charged "hostages" and portrayed them as martyrs.
After his re-election in the 2024 United States presidential election, Trump pardoned about 1,500 people convicted of offenses related to the attack on January 20, 2025.
Casualties One person was killed. Five people died. To varying degrees, their deaths have been attributed to the riot. Over a hundred police officers were injured.
Deaths Ashli Babbitt
As lawmakers were being evacuated by Capitol Police, Ashli Elizabeth Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran, attempted to climb through a shattered window in a barricaded door and was shot in the chest by Lt. Michael Leroy Byrd, dying from the wound. The bullet pierced Ashli in her left anterior shoulder, perforated her left brachial plexus, trachea, upper lobe of the right lung and second anterior rib, and landed in her right anterior shoulder. The shooting was recorded on several cameras. Capitol Police officers had been warned that many attackers were carrying concealed weapons, although a subsequent search revealed no weapons in Babbitt's possession. In the minutes before she was shot, the crowd had threatened police. A fellow rally attendee who was right near Babbitt recalled she had been warned not to proceed through the window: "A number of police and Secret Service were saying 'Get back! Get down! Get out of the way!'; she didn't heed the call...".
Republican Representative Markwayne Mullin said he witnessed the shooting; he felt that Lt. Byrd "didn't have a choice" but to shoot, and that this action "saved people's lives". According to Mullin, at the time, law enforcement was trying to defend two fronts to the House Chamber from the mob, and "a lot of members [of Congress] and staff that were in danger at the time". Zachary Jordan Alam (who was standing next to Babbitt) was videotaped smashing the glass window that Babbitt tried to climb through. He was later indicted on twelve federal counts, including assaulting officers with a dangerous weapon. Following the routine process for shootings by Capitol Police officers, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and the Justice Department investigated Babbitt's death and declined to charge Lt. Byrd. Babbitt was a follower of the QAnon conspiracy theory, and had tweeted the previous day "the storm is here", a reference to its prophecy. There has since been an effort by conservative media and political figures to present her as a martyr.
Brian Sicknick
Others
Three other Trump supporters also died: Rosanne Boyland, 34, of Kennesaw, Georgia, Kevin Greeson, 55, from Athens, Alabama, and Benjamin Philips, 50, of Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania. (title later changed to "5 dead after pro-Trump supporters stormed US Capitol") Boyland was a radicalized follower of QAnon whose family had begged her not to attend. Initially thought to have been trampled to death by the crowd, she was later confirmed to have died of an amphetamine overdose during the attack. Her death was classified as accidental by the D.C. medical examiner's office. Greeson reportedly had a heart attack outdoors on the Capitol grounds, and was declared dead at 2:05p.m., shortly before the breach of the Capitol. He had become a radicalized Trump supporter in the preceding years; in December 2020, he declared: "Let's take this fucking Country BACK!! Load your guns and take to the streets!" His family said he was "not there to participate in violence or rioting, nor did he condone such actions". Philips was initially reported to have died of a stroke after splitting from his group at 10:30 in the morning. There is no indication that he had participated in the attack. Philips was the founder of Trumparoo.com, a social media page for Trump supporters, and he made arrangements for fellow supporters to travel to D.C. Greeson and Philips' deaths were later confirmed to be natural deaths from both coronary heart disease and hypertensive heart disease, ruled the D.C. medical examiner's office.
Four police officers who defended the Capitol during the attack subsequently died by suicide.
Injuries
Participants in the civil disorder and responders had been injured in the struggle. There were 138 officers (73 Capitol Police and 65 Metropolitan Police) injured, of whom 15 were hospitalized, some with severe injuries. All had been released from the hospital by January 11.
Shortly after 2:00p.m., several rioters attempted to breach a door on the West Front of the Capitol. They dragged three D.C. Metro police officers out of formation and down a set of stairs, trapped them in a crowd, and assaulted them with improvised weapons (including hockey sticks, crutches, flags, poles, sticks, and stolen police shields) as the mob chanted "police stand down!" and "USA!". At least one of the officers was also stomped.
Some rioters beat officers on the head with lead pipes, and others used chemical irritants, stun guns, fists, sticks, poles and clubs against the police. Some trampled and stampeded police, pushed them down stairs or against statues or shone laser pointers into their eyes. One D.C. Metro officer was hit six times with a stun gun, was beaten with a flagpole, suffered a mild heart attack, and lost a fingertip. Three officers were hit on their heads by a fire extinguisher allegedly thrown by a retired firefighter.
According to the Capitol Police officers' union chairman, multiple officers sustained traumatic brain injuries. One had two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal discs; another lost an eye. One was stabbed with a metal fence stake. One was crushed between a door and a riot shield while defending the west side of the Capitol with other officers against rioters; he later had headaches he believed stemmed from a concussion.
Morale among the Capitol Police plummeted after the riots. The department responded to several incidents where its officers threatened to harm themselves; one officer turned in her weapon because she feared what she would do with it. Two police officers who responded to the attack died by suicide in the following days: one Capitol Police officer, Officer Howard Liebengood, three days after the attack, and a D.C. Metro Police officer, Officer Jeffrey Smith, who had been injured in the attack, afterward. Some members of Congress and press reports have included these deaths in the casualty count, for a total of seven deaths. Metropolitan Police Officers Kyle DeFreytag and Gunther Hashida died by suicide on July 10 and 29, respectively; both had responded to the Capitol attack.
As of June 3, 2021, at least 17 police officers (10 Capitol Police, seven Metropolitan Police) remained out of work due to injuries sustained in the riot five months previously. Of that number, six Metropolitan Police officers were still on medical leave in mid-July; the Capitol Police did not disclose how many of its officers were on leave, but confirmed that some officers had acquired career-ending disabilities.
Completion of electoral vote count
Congress reconvened in the evening of January6 after the Capitol was cleared of trespassers. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell reopened the Senate's session around 8:00p.m., saying the Senate refused to be intimidated and that it would count the electors and declare the president "tonight", after two hours of debate on the objection to the Arizona electors. He called the vote the most consequential in his thirty-plus years of congressional service. At 9:58p.m., the Senate rejected the objection 93–6, with only six Republicans voting in favor: Ted Cruz (TX), Josh Hawley (MO), Cindy Hyde-Smith (MS), John Neely Kennedy (LA), Roger Marshall (KS), and Tommy Tuberville (AL).
At 11:08p.m., the House rejected a similar motion to dispute the Arizona vote by a margin of 303–121. All the "yeas" came from Republicans while the "nays" were from 83 Republicans and 220 Democrats. A planned objection to the Georgia slate of electors was rejected after co-signing Senator, Kelly Loeffler (R-GA), withdrew her support in light of the day's events. Another objection was raised by Hawley and Representative Scott Perry (R–PA) to the Pennsylvania slate of electors, triggering another two-hour split in the joint session to debate the objection. At 12:30a.m. on January7, the Senate rejected this objection by a 92–7 vote, with the same people voting the same way as before with the exceptions of Senators Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) and Rick Scott (R-FL) voting in favor and John N. Kennedy voting against.
At 3:08a.m., the House of Representatives similarly rejected the motion to sustain the objection by a margin of 282–138. Again, all the votes in favor were Republican, while this time only 64 Republicans voted against and 218 Democrats voted against. Representative Peter Meijer (R–MI) said that several of his Republican colleagues in the House would have voted to certify the votes, but did not out of fear for the safety of their families, and that at least one specifically voted to overturn Biden's victory against their conscience because they were shaken by the mob attack that day.