Cop who took selfies and another who put on MAGA hat and took rioters around Capitol are suspended

Two officers with the Capitol Police have been suspended and a third member of law-enforcement arrested for alleged misconduct, a congressman said on Monday, as it emerged a total of 15 Capitol Police officers are being investigated.

The selfie moment was captured by journalist Timothy Burke, and posted to Twitter in a tweet now retweeted 233,000 times, and ‘liked’ 220,000 times. 

News of their suspension was confirmed by Tim Ryan, an Ohio representative who chairs a House panel probing last week’s events. 

Ryan also said interim Capitol Police Chief Yogananda Pittman is taking ‘aggressive action’ to see if there was any internal ‘help’ by officers in the Capitol chaos. 

‘I know there were two people suspended,’ he said on Monday, in a press conference giving an update on progress in his inquiry. 

‘One was the selfie officer and another was an officer who put a MAGA hat on and started directing some people around.’

Neither officer has been named. 

A photograph taken by @Report4America’s Chris Jones showed a Capitol Police officer in a MAGA hat, holding a megaphone and addressing the mob.

Jones reported that the officer put on the hat in an attempt to get the attention of the rioters, and distract the crowd surging toward an open door of the building.

As the officer waded into the frenzied group, he became surrounded, giving other police officers the chance to shut the doors behind him, Jones told Military.com.

The actions of some of the officers during the insurrection sparked fury, with Joe Biden among those noting that if the rioters had been with Black Lives Matter they would have received very different treatment.

The chief of the Capitol Police resigned after the building was invaded for the first time since 1814, and the Sergeants-at-Arms of both the House and Senate were forced to quit. 

Others have been praised for their actions, including Eugene Goodman, who averted a possible disaster by distracting the frenzied mob and provoking them to follow him away from the unlocked Senate chamber door.

One member of the Capitol Police, Brian Sicknick, 42, died on Thursday after he was hit with a fire extinguisher during the riot.

Another who was on duty on Wednesday, Howard Liebengood, died by suicide on Saturday.

Four rioters died – one Californian woman, Ashli Babbitt, shot dead by Capitol Police; and three others who died during medical emergencies. 

‘You can peacefully protest, you can have your opinion, you can scream from the rooftop about your opinion, but you can’t impede the process, the constitutional process that we have been following in this country for over 200 years,’ Ryan said. 

‘They were illegal acts and those people should have been immediately arrested.’

He condemned Donald Trump for his unwillingness to concede and for continuing to claim that the election was fraudulent. 

He also questioned security at the Capitol.

‘There were clearly enormous strategic and planning failures by the Capitol police, by the Sergeant At Arms, and anybody else who was a part of coordinating this effort,’ he said.

‘I think it’s pretty clear that 

‘They were illegal acts and those people should have been immediately arrested,’ said Ryan.

He went on to condemn President Trump for his unwillingness to concede and continuous claims that the election was fraudulent. He also questioned security at the Capitol.

‘There were clearly enormous strategic and planning failures by the Capitol police, by the Sergeant At Arms, and anybody else who was a part of coordinating this effort,’ he said.

‘I think it’s pretty clear that there’s going to be a number of people without employment very very soon.’

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