What We Learned About the Capitol Attack: Live Updates
Michelle Obama, the former first lady, criticized on Thursday a “gulf” between the police response to the violent mob of Trump supporters that marched on the Capitol a day earlier and the more forceful actions taken by officers in response to largely peaceful Black Lives Matter protests in American cities last year.
In a lengthy, emotional statement that she posted on Twitter, Mrs. Obama joined many people in accusing President Trump and law enforcement officials of a double standard in policing, one she and others argued was inextricably tied to the race of the people involved.
“Yesterday made it painfully clear that certain Americans are, in fact, allowed to denigrate the flag and symbols of our nation,” she wrote. “They’ve just got to look the right way.”
Mrs. Obama also condemned the riot inside the Capitol, saying that those involved had “desecrated the center of American government” in an event that she said was spurred on by an “infantile and unpatriotic” Mr. Trump.
In her statement, she specifically pointed to an incident this summer in which officers violently cleared protesters from a square outside the White House to allow a photo opportunity for Mr. Trump.
“In city after city, day after day, we saw peaceful protesters met with brute force. We saw cracked skulls and mass arrests, law enforcement pepper spraying its way through a peaceful demonstration for a presidential photo op,” Mrs. Obama wrote.
The response to the mob this week had been considerably more muted, she said, an imbalance that she found painful to grapple with.
“I hurt for our country,” Mrs. Obama said. “And I wish I had all the solutions to make things better. I wish I had the confidence that people who know better will act like it for more than a news cycle or two.”
Simon & Schuster said on Thursday that it would cancel the publication of an upcoming book by Senator Josh Hawley, one of several members of Congress who tried to overturn the results of the presidential election.
Mr. Hawley, a Missouri Republican and Trump ally, has been criticized for challenging the results and accused of helping incite the mob that stormed the Capitol on Wednesday. His book, “The Tyranny of Big Tech,” was scheduled to be published in June.
“We did not come to this decision lightly,” Simon & Schuster said in a statement. “As a publisher it will always be our mission to amplify a variety of voices and viewpoints: At the same time we take seriously our larger public responsibility as citizens, and cannot support Senator Hawley after his role in what became a dangerous threat.”
In a statement posted to Twitter, Mr. Hawley said that the cancellation of his book was an affront to the First Amendment.
“This could not be more Orwellian,” he said. “Simon & Schuster is canceling my contract because I was representing my constituents, leading a debate on the Senate floor on voter integrity, which they have now decided to redefine as sedition.”
The subject of Mr. Hawley’s book, which was already available for preorder on Amazon and other retailers, is not about the election or Mr. Trump, but about technology corporations like Google, Facebook and Amazon. Its cancellation was remarkably swift and raised questions about how publishers will approach future books by conservatives who have supported Mr. Trump’s efforts to invalidate the election.
It’s unclear if Mr. Hawley will have to return his book advance, or whether Simon & Schuster will forfeit it. It also remains to be seen whether Mr. Hawley will seek another publisher or self-publish the book.
The chief of the United States Capitol Police will resign Jan. 16, a spokeswoman for the agency said on Thursday, one day after the agency was roundly criticized for failing to protect the Capitol from a violent incursion by extremists loyal to President Trump.
The chief, Steven A. Sund, made the decision hours after Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, had called on him to resign. “Mr. Sund, he hasn’t even called us since this happened,” Ms. Pelosi said. The Capitol Police officers’ union also had called for Mr. Sund to step down.
Mr. Sund had been the chief of the Capitol Police since June 2019, and had previously served with the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington for more than 25 years. As Capitol Police chief, he oversaw more than 2,300 officers and civilian employees responsible for protecting Congress and the building itself.
But the destruction on Wednesday, when a…
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