Former U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven A. Sund is expected to testify before the House Administration oversight subcommittee Tuesday to discuss the security failures that led to the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
House Republican leadership has promised to scrutinize the defunct Democratic-appointed and controlled Jan. 6 Select Committee from the last Congress, which GOP lawmakers say botched a proper after-action report by being too politicized and not focused on how to prevent a future security breach.
Mr. Sund leveled searing criticism at federal law enforcement and intelligence authorities earlier in the year for not delivering to Capitol Police information they had before the attack, and he slammed military leadership for refusing to deploy the National Guard for hours following the breach.
The former Capitol Police chief resigned on Jan. 16, 2021 — hours after then-House Speaker Nancy called for him to step down from his post and blamed him for not securing the Capitol. He has defended his actions, which included calling for the National Guard six times for three days before the attack but never receiving that support.
“Everything seems like a cover-up,” Mr. Sund said during an interview last month with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. “I’m not one to believe in conspiracy theories, but when you piece together the information and intelligence available to them, it becomes watered down. I wasn’t receiving any intelligence, and there was no support from the National Guard when our very own Capitol was under attack for a staggering 71 minutes.”
He said, “If people were reporting the intelligence correctly, if I was allowed to do my job as the chief … we wouldn’t be here. This didn’t have to happen. Everything appears to be a cover-up. I’m a little p——- off.”
Mr. Sund will testify before the oversight panel chaired by Rep. Barry Loudermilk, Georgia Republican. The committee has been amping up its investigative efforts into the Jan. 6 committee since last month, as U.S. prosecutors have indicted former President Donald Trump on charges related to the Jan. 6 attack.
Mr. Loudermilk wrote in a series of letters last month that the Jan. 6 committee did not follow the law or House rules in preserving and turning over all of the data and documents related to the investigation by the end of the congressional term last December.
In a letter to Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi Democrat, the former chair of the Jan. 6 panel, Mr. Loudermilk said that all committee chairs have a responsibility to archive “noncurrent records” at the end of a Congress.
He added that the Jan. 6 panel had stricter requirements to turn over all records to any committee designated by the speaker, which includes the panel that Mr. Loudermilk chairs.
The Georgia Republican said that he was concerned that some of the records were not archived and that video recordings of depositions were not included.
“The fact that we’ve discovered a number of missing documents and videos from Rep. Bennie Thompson‘s investigation into Jan. 6 begs the question, what else is he hiding? We are going to follow the facts and leave no stone unturned,” Mr. Loudermilk, Georgia Republican, told The Washington Times.
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.