Ranking Member Raskin’s Opening Statement at First Hearing of Republicans’ Shameful Select Subcommittee to Whitewash Jan. 6
Washington, D.C. (January 14, 2026)—Today, Rep. Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, delivered opening remarks at the first hearing of Republicans’ Select Subcommittee to Investigate the Remaining Questions Surrounding January 6, 2021, highlighting the consequences of fictitious conspiracies theories amplified by the Trump Administration and House Republicans as they seek to further undermine law enforcement and justify sweeping pardons of 1,600 rioters who attacked the Capitol.
Below are Ranking Member Raskin’s remarks at today’s hearing.
WATCH Ranking Member Raskin’s opening statement.
Ranking Member Jamie Raskin
Select Subcommittee to Investigate the Remaining Questions Surrounding January 6, 2021
Hearing on “Examining the Investigation into the DNC and RNC Pipe Bombs”
January 14, 2026
Thank you very kindly, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to our witnesses for joining us.
I’d like to begin by offering appreciation to the men and women of the FBI who apprehended the January 6th pipe bomb suspect. This has been a rare bright spot for federal law enforcement over the last year. I also want to thank the Capitol officers who defended us with such valor and such courage on January 6th, who defended the Members of the House and the Senate, our staffs and everyone else who was caught up in the siege against the Capitol in the attempt to overthrow the 2020 presidential election. Those officers continue to defend us and continue to endure the abuse of the January 6th insurrectionists. Check out this video from what just happened last week.
The abuse of our officers continues, just as the plaque, which was passed overwhelmingly by Congress to be installed in the Capitol complex, is still not been put up by Speaker Johnson.
The prosecution of Brian Cole, the pipe bomb suspect, remains ongoing. The full facts of the case have not yet emerged. Under our criminal justice system, of course, he’s presumed innocent until proven guilty. And so, this hearing is, at best, premature. I hope it does nothing to recklessly endanger the prosecution of Mr. Cole.
But here’s what we do know. We know that Brian Cole voted for Donald Trump twice. We know that in his own words, he was inspired and incited by Donald Trump’s Big Lie, the pathetic lie that the 2020 election had been stolen, a lie that has been debunked and repudiated by more than 60 different federal and state court decisions across the land, in every court that’s looked at it and, of course, was rejected by the Congress of the United States as well.
Mr. Cole told investigators he was in D.C. because he was “going to a protest in support of Donald Trump.” He told the FBI that he believed the narrative that Trump had spread and the election was indeed tampered with, “Someone needs to speak up, right?” Well, like the thousands of Trump supporters who stormed the capitol on January 6th, Mr. Cole did something more than just speak up. He set what the FBI concluded were viable explosive devices on Capitol Hill, mere feet away from where thousands of people live and work and drop their kids off at daycare. It is only due to the heroic actions of the Capitol Police and a watchful bystander that these devices were discovered and disarmed.
Make no mistake, Mr. Cole’s political goals appear to have been no different than those of the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and hundreds of cop beaters and rioters who stormed the Capitol to foment violence on that day to terrorize the police, but most of all, to stop the steal and overturn the election that was certified in the United States of America, with Joe Biden defeating Donald Trump by more than 7 million votes, 306 to 232 in the electoral college.
There are only two real differences between the pipe bomber and the rioters. First, unlike so many of the rioters, Mr. Cole was thankfully unsuccessful in his efforts to injure law enforcement and innocent people on that day. Second, unlike the other rioters, it’s not yet been determined whether Mr. Cole actually got a pardon from Donald Trump.
Trump granted “a full, complete and unconditional pardon to all individuals convicted of offenses related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6th, 2021.” Mr. Cole was convicted. Would he be covered by this unprecedented, corrupt pardon offered by Donald Trump, who incited the insurrection against the union? Well, Mr. Cole’s lawyer definitely seems to think so. President Trump and his DOJ have already attempted to legitimize violence against the police on that day. Is it their position that the pardon extends to Mr. Cole, as someone who was involved in the events that occurred near the Capitol, or is there a position that it’s okay to beat police officers with confederate battle flags, Donald Trump flags, American flags, tase them, haze them, vilify them, demonize them, taunt them, trample them, kick them and punch them—but they draw the line at planting an explosive device? I’d be very interested to know the answer to that.
It’s been obvious for quite some time that the pipe bomber was motivated by the same lies and violent rhetoric as everybody else who followed Donald Trump’s orders on that day, and to avoid that reality, Republicans have deployed conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory about the pipe bomber. Donald Trump falsely claimed the FBI knew who it was all along. Dan Bongino, the former podcaster turned former FBI Deputy Director who recently quit for mysterious reasons, told us that this was a setup, he said it was an inside job.
Just a few months ago, The Blaze wrote a ludicrous article pinning the pipe bombs on an innocent Capitol Police officer on the basis of how she walked, which, unsurprisingly, was quickly exposed for the pure concoction it was. But that did not stop multiple Republican Members of Congress, including, I’m afraid to say, you, Mr. Chairman, at least I’m told, although I haven’t said seen what you said directly, but certainly multiple Members of Congress promoted the article and its authors, and the false and dangerous idea that it was a former Capitol Police officer who planted those bombs, an idea that continues to fester in the deepest and darkest corners of the extremist internet.
Mr. Chairman, I think that the Capitol Police officer deserves an apology from any Member of Congress who participated in that particular lie and conspiracy theory. These conspiracy theories have finally been debunked, but they’ve not been put to rest. We’re here as part of the Select Subcommittee to Investigate the Remaining Questions Surrounding January 6th, 2021. Since the identity and motivation of the pipe bomber had been one of the last question marks remaining, I’m interested to know, what are the remaining questions? Because we’ve got a bunch of answers, but I certainly have some questions remaining. One question I’ve got is, why is it that those who pushed the Big Lie and tried to steal the election and participated in the riots at the Capitol—from Ed Martin to Heather Honey to Jared Wise, Jeffrey Clark—why are they now holding positions of power and influence in this Administration? We should also be holding a hearing on how Donald Trump pardoned the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers and other felons for violently assaulting hundreds of police officers against the wishes of more than 80% of the American people who reject those pardons.
And, what have been the public safety implications of those pardons? How about a hearing on the 33 pardoned rioters, who have since gone on to commit other felony crimes, including possession of child pornography, rape, conspiracy to commit murder of FBI agents, kidnaping, sexual assault, aggravated robbery, reckless homicide in so many more. How about a hearing on that?
How about a hearing on why the Speaker refuses to put up a plaque that, by law, was supposed to have been posted in 2023, in honor of the police officers who defended us? How about a hearing on why, unlike Ashli Babbitt’s family, which got a handsome $5 million payout even after two government investigations determined that the police had acted reasonably and appropriately in her case, how about a hearing on why the 140 officers who were injured on that day, and the five officers who died in the days that followed, including Officer Brian Sicknick and his family, why have they received nothing? Not one penny, not $1. And Ashli Babbitt’s family got $5 million, even though there was no finding of any culpability on the part of the government. How about a hearing on that? How about a hearing on whether we’ve done justice to the police officers who defended us on that day? How about a hearing on that, Mr. Chairman?
Well, nothing that can be said around the edges of this nightmare are ever going to take away or erase the indelible truth of what happened. The President, not being able to handle his loss by more than 7 million votes in the presidential election, used every means at his disposal to try to overturn the election, to concoct fraudulent electoral slates, to try to get the Department of Justice to just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and my Republican friends in Congress, to trying to force the Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence, to assert powers he didn’t have to reject electoral college votes, and then to unleash a mob of thousands of people to attack Congress. That’s the reality.
Nobody’s laid a glove on a single sentence in the report of the January 6th Select Committee. Not one. And I defy anyone to challenge that statement. I would love to see someone show how anything we have found has been contradicted. Nothing. Not presidential firings and demotions of devoted civil servants, like all the DOJ lawyers and FBI agents who’ve been sacked and demoted. Not the presidential pardons, not all the tweets about how this was a day of love. Nothing will ever whitewash the indelible facts of that day.
Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your indulgence, and I yield back to you.