Page:Materials in Support of H. Res. 24.pdf/13

 'of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country. So let’s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue'. While President Trump was speaking, Vice President Pence issued a public letter in which he made clear that he would follow the Constitution and the law despite President Trump’s urgings to the contrary. “I do not believe,” he wrote, “that the Founders of our country intended to invest the vice president with unilateral authority to decide which electoral votes should be counted during the Joint Session of Congress, and no vice president in American history has ever asserted such authority. … It is my considered judgment that my oath to support and defend the Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.”

As soon as President Trump concluded his speech, thousands of attendees marched down Pennsylvania Avenue toward Capitol Hill—just as President Trump had instructed them. On January 6, at 1:00 PM, as the President’s rally was drawing to a close, the House and the Senate met in a Joint Session of Congress, with the Vice President presiding, to count the Electoral College’s votes for who “shall be the President. [sic]” as required by the Twelfth Amendment and the Electoral Count Act. By around 2:00 PM, the supporters attending the rally had surged toward the Capitol and were attempting to breach its security barriers, requiring the Capitol Police to issue a number of security orders including one at 2:03 PM ordering an internal relocation of those in the Cannon House Office Building.
 * C. The Attack on the Capitol

At 2:02 PM, less than an hour after the President concluded his speech, reports confirmed that his supporters were attempting to breach the Capitol itself. Within minutes, Members of the House and Senate were told that the Capitol was in lockdown and were alerted to stay away from doors and windows. By 2:07 PM, the mob had breached the steps on the east side of the Capitol