Surveillance footage from inside the Capitol on January 6 shows ‘mostly peaceful chaos’, Tucker Carlson said on Monday night – broadcasting clips of the infamous ‘QAnon Shaman’ apparently being shown around the Senate, and airing images of Officer Brian Sicknick seemingly ‘healthy and vigorous’ after the riot, which is widely believed to have caused his death.
Carlson has been handed more than 40,000 hours of unseen surveillance camera footage from the riot, and will air select clips over the course of this week.
The Fox News host told his viewers the footage – given to him by Kevin McCarthy, the Speaker of the House – challenged the prevailing narrative of the riot as a violent insurrection.
He also referenced Ray Epps – a rioter who supporters of Donald Trump said was an FBI informant. Epps himself has testified that he was not working for the government.
‘They were orderly and meek,’ said Carlson of those who stormed the Capitol. ‘These were not insurrectionists; they were sightseers.’
Tucker Carlson on Monday night released footage from inside the Capitol on January 6, including clips showing the ‘QAnon Shaman’, Jacob Chansley (above), being apparently ‘escorted’ through the building
Carlson said they ‘obviously revere the Capitol’, noting they took selfies and ‘queue up in neat little lines’.
‘Deadly insurrection.’ Everything about that phrase is a lie,’ he said.
‘Very little about January 6 was organized or violent.
‘Surveillance video from inside the Capitol shows mostly peaceful chaos.’
Carlson pointed to footage showing the ‘QAnon Shaman’ – a bare-chested, Viking helmet-wearing Jacob Chansley – inside the Capitol.
Chansley, a 33-year-old naval veteran from Arizona, was one of the most high-profile figures to enter the Capitol on January 6.
He has been jailed for almost four years for ‘obstructing an official proceeding.’
In the footage, Chansley appears to be guided by an official as he wanders the Capitol.
He passes a line of riot police, who make no move to stop him.
Then they escort him to various entrances of the chamber which appear to be locked, and eventually find him an open door through which he vanishes.
‘Virtually every moment of his time inside the Capitol was caught on tape,’ said Carlson.
‘The tapes show the Capitol police never stopped Jacob Chansley. They helped him. They acted as his tour guides.’
Carlson also showed the moments after Officer Brian Sicknick was confronted by the rioters.
Sicknick, 42, died on January 7 – the day after the riot.
Brian Sicknick is seen shortly after the Capitol was breached. Carlson said he appeared ‘healthy and vigorous’
In April 2021, the DC medical examiner ruled that Sicknick, who was injured while confronting rioters, suffered a stroke and died from natural causes.
‘To this day, media accounts describe Sicknick as someone who was, quote, ‘slain’ on January 6,’ Carlson said.
‘The video we reviewed proves that is a lie.’
Carlson said the officer was ‘healthy and vigorous,’ and noted he was wearing a helmet.
‘So it’s hard to imagine he was killed by a head injury,’ he said.
‘Whatever happened to Brian Sicknick was very obviously not the result of violence he suffered at the entrance to the Capitol.
‘This tape overturns the single most powerful and politically useful lie the Democrats have told us about January 6.’
There have been multiple deaths linked to the riot, including four Trump supporters – one of whom, Ashli Babbitt, was shot dead by Capitol Police.
Four officers died by suicide in the days and weeks after the riot.
There have also been roughly 1,000 arrests.
