In the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, American political leaders almost universally condemned the riot as an act of domestic terrorism that threatened democracy. Now, President Trump calls Jan. 6 a “day of love” and the rioters “great patriots.” And since he issued mass pardons to the rioters, his administration has been trying to rewrite history.

NPR has tracked every Jan. 6 prosecution in a public database, and, drawing on thousands of hours of footage and years of reporting, created a front-line account of the riot. This peoject, which was 5 years in the making, vividly shows the planning for “revolution” and the brutality of violence on a day that continues to shape American politics.

I built the timeline and maps that structure Chapter 3 of NPR’s Jan. 6 archive, following the movement of the crowd as events escalated.
The work translates scattered footage and records into a coherent, ground-level account of the day.