- Footage shows GOP Rep.
Barry Loudermilk leading a Capitol tour the day before the attack. - A person on the tour returned to the Capitol grounds the next day, the
January 6 committee said.
The committee investigating
The House committee said one of the people on the tour returned the following day and can be heard in the video making threats against several Democratic lawmakers, including now-Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerry Nadler, and Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.
"They got it surrounded. It's all the way up there on the hill, and it's all the way around, and they're coming in, coming in like white on rice for Pelosi, Nadler, even you, AOC," the man says in the video released by the committee. "We're coming to take you out and pull you out by your hairs."
The footage also shows a man with a flagpole "appearing to have a sharpened end," the committee said.
"That's for somebody special, somebody special," the man says.
The video also shows photos taken by members of the tour, including a photo of Nadler's office plaque.
"When I get done with you, you're going to need a shine on top of that bald head," the rally attendee adds, referring to Pelosi.
The committee's video also shows a member on the tour group took photos of lawmaker's headshots.
The release of the footage comes a day after Republican Rep. Rodney Davis of Illinois released a letter from US Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger about the tour that said the police force did not "consider any of the activities we observed as suspicious."
"So they were there for the rally at the Ellipse," Loudermilk told Roll Call on Tuesday, referring to the members of his tour. He added that "none at all" were on the grounds of the Capitol the following day, a claim contradicted by the video footage.
In a letter sent to Loudermilk on Wednesday, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the chair of the committee investigating the Capitol attack, once again asked the Georgia Republican to speak with the committee, while referencing the footage.
"Surveillance footage shows a tour of approximately ten individuals led by you to areas in the Rayburn, Longworth, and Cannon House Office Buildings, as well as the entrances to tunnels leading to the U.S. Capitol," he wrote. "The behavior of these individuals during the January 5, 2021 tour raises concerns about their activity and intent while inside the Capitol complex."
Thompson added: "Individuals on the tour photographed and recorded areas of the complex not typically of interest to tourists, including hallways, staircases, and security checkpoints."
The committee had previously asked Loudermilk to speak with the committee about the tour but had been rebuffed.
In the days after the January 6 attack, Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey and over 30 of her colleagues sent a letter to Capitol Police asking for an investigation into "suspicious behavior and access given to visitors" on January 5. The congresswoman cited an apparent resemblance between the visitors and the rioters who attacked the complex the following day.
Republicans on the Committee on House Administration later said they had reviewed security-camera footage covering the Capitol complex in the days before the attack and denied that there had been any tours.
"There were no tours, no large groups, no one with MAGA hats on," a Republican aide anonymously told The Hill in February. "There's nothing in there remotely fitting the depiction in Mikie Sherrill's letter."
The video released by the committee Wednesday shows a few members of the tour were wearing MAGA hats, contradicting the aide's claim.
Loudermilk also previously led an ethics complaint against the Democrats who had signed onto Sherrill's letter, calling the allegations "morally reprehensible and a stain on this institution."
In a statement following the release of the video, Loudermilk accused the committee of undermining the Capitol Police, pointing to the force's assessment that the visit was not suspicious.
"The pictures show children holding bags from the House gift shop, which was open to visitors, and taking pictures of the Rayburn train," he said. "Nowhere that I went with the visitors in the House Office Buildings on January 5th were breached on January 6th; and, to my knowledge, no one in that group was criminally charged in relation to January 6th."
He added: "Once again, the Committee released this letter to the press, and did not contact me. This type of behavior is irresponsible and has real consequences — including ongoing death threats to myself, my family, and my staff."
Ben Kamens, a Democratic staffer on Capitol Hill who worked for Democratic Rep. Andy Kim of New Jersey in January 2021, said on Twitter that he'd witnessed the group in the Capitol complex without an escort on the afternoon of January 5.
—Ben Kamens (@BeeKamens) June 15, 2022
Kamens told Insider in a Twitter direct message that he saw the tour group at the Capitol Police desk at the entrance to the Cannon Tunnel, which heads toward the US Capitol. He said he was showing an intern around on her first day.
He added that it was unusual to see tour groups in the complex at the time, given COVID-19-related restrictions on tours.
"Seeing any tour groups was surprising in and of itself," he said. "The only way to get groups in was official business visits, which were still strongly discouraged."