Less than 5 months ago, hordes of Trump supporters and QAnon fanatics stormed the Capitol on Donald Trump’s orders to disrupt the certification of Joe Biden’s presidency. The resulting chaos led to mass destruction at the Capitol, with more than 140 people injured and 5 dead. Yesterday, the House passed a bill to establish an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the violent insurrection. The final vote was 252-175, with 35 Republicans breaking with their party to support the bill.
After the vote, Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) thanked the Republicans who crossed the aisle, before launching into fierce condemnation of all the Republicans who didn’t. Ryan reamed the Republicans making excuses for opposing the commission, shouting, “Holy cow! Incoherence! No idea what you’re talking about.” He then launched into the rank hypocrisy of Republicans who established multiple investigations on the baseless Benghazi scandal to smear Hillary Clinton. “Benghazi!” Ryan said. “You guys chased the former secretary of state all over the country, spent millions of dollars.”
He continued, “We have people scaling the Capitol, hitting the Capitol Police with lead pipes across the head and we can’t get bipartisanship? What else has to happen in this country? Cops! This is a slap in the face to every rank-and-file cop in the United States.” Ryan ended his rant shouting, “We’re gonna need two political parties in this country both living in reality, and you ain’t one of them!”
I won’t stop fighting. Our Democracy depends on it. We must get to the bottom of what happened on January 6th, full stop. Retweet if you’re with me.
— Tim Ryan (@TimRyan) May 19, 2021
The entire speech is less than a minute, but Ryan effectively called out the Republicans for their denial of reality, their abuse of the system, and their lip service to supporting police while ignoring the very cops who protect them. Now, the bill moves to the Senate, where Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has said he will oppose it. It’s highly unlikely that 10 Republican senators will cross the aisle. Democrats could (and should) nuke the filibuster to effectively exercise their slim majority, but that’s largely a pipe dream until moderate holdouts like Sen. Joe Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema agree to ditch the filibuster.
Many took to social media in support of Ryan’s rant:
My good friend @TimRyan said it all. #Jan6thCommissionNow https://t.co/crnuUxFsrU
— Jaime Harrison, DNC Chair (@harrisonjaime) May 19, 2021
Go get em. @TimRyan
— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) May 19, 2021
In a world full of Mitch McConnells, be a Tim Ryan 🔥
— Jake Lobin (@JakeLobin) May 20, 2021
3.1 million views and 138K followers. Folks please don’t just watch this. Follow Democrat @TimRyan and ask everyone you know to do the same. We have the majority and it feels like we are in the minority. We need to flip every single seat & hold each we can pic.twitter.com/YvPTekXNgR
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) May 20, 2021
props to @TimRyan for the big “Mr Smith Goes to Washington” energy herepic.twitter.com/SfageZeuzK
— shauna (@goldengateblond) May 20, 2021
Ryan’s passionate rant could bolster his political aspirations, as the former presidential candidate has announced he’s running for the Senate. Ryan will be competing for Republican Sen. Rob Portman’s seat, who announced he’s retiring in 2022.
(via HuffPost, image: screencap/Forbes Breaking News)
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