Newly-Released Jan. 6 Video Shows Sen. Grassley Evacuating As Jacob Chansley and Other Rioters Rush By Mere Feet Away

On Jan. 6, 2021, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) — then the third in line to the presidency — came closer to the rioters than previously known, as seen in newly-released video footage.

The new video clips were provided in response to media requests regarding some of the criminal cases stemming from the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and Grassley’s close call to the rioters “adds new dissonance to Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s on-air minimization of the siege,” wrote Politico’s Kyle Cheney and Jordain Carney.

Earlier this month, Carlson featured selected clips from the more than 40,000 hours of Jan. 6 footage that Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) allowed him to access. The footage shown by Carlson largely showed nonviolent moments from that day, along with the top-rated Fox News host’s commentary that only “a small percentage” of the rioters were “hooligans” who “committed vandalism,” and claiming the “overwhelming majority” were “peaceful,” and “ordinary and meek.”

The slanted presentation by Carlson drew sharp condemnation from prosecutors, the family of Brian Sicknick, and the chief of the Capitol Police — and even congressional Republicans denounced him for downplaying the violence and seriousness of the breach of the Capitol during the certification of the 2020 Electoral College votes, when so many key members of the federal government were present in the building.

One of those people was Grassley, the senior senator from Iowa who at the time was the Senate President pro tem, meaning he was third in the presidential line of succession behind Vice President Mike Pence and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).

Minutes before the below video clip was filmed, Pence had been evacuated from the Senate floor by his Secret Service agents, and Grassley was filling in for the vice president to preside over the Senate’s constitutional duties regarding the Electoral College certification.

The video “appears to have been taken by Jan. 6 defendant Daniel Adams,” reported Politico, was was in “the first wave of rioters who breached the building,” along with Jacob Chansley (better known as the “QAnon Shaman” and notable for his distinctive horned headwear, spear, and large tattoos across his chest) and Proud Boy Dominic Pezzola. Pezzola is shown in other video footage using a police officer’s riot shield “to shatter a Senate window and ignite the breach of the building near the chamber.”

In this clip, Grassley can be seen being swiftly escorted by his security detail past a hallway entrance as a lone police officer stands in the hallway arch as Pezzola, Chansley, Adams, and the other rioters stream by right in front of him.

Politico noted that other top government officials came very close to a “direct brush” with the mob: Pence was within 40 feet of the rioters while he was being evacuated, Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman famously confronted rioters just outside the entrance to the Senate chamber, and then-Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and his security detail were “within sight of rioter Joshua Pruitt while waiting for an elevator.”

When asked about the video clip, Grassley told the Politico reporters he did not remember many details of the moment. “I wasn’t aware of any of it,” he said, saying that his security detail had just told him, “We’ve got to get you out of here.”

Watch the video above, via Politico.