Jan. 6 committee wants to speak with GOP lawmaker over Capitol tour

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack wants to speak with Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.), after receiving evidence that on Jan. 5, 2021, he gave a tour of the Capitol complex.

The committee's chair, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), and vice chair, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), sent Loudermilk a letter saying they are seeking more information on the tour and its participants, and want to ask him questions about "public reporting and witness accounts" that indicate "some individuals and groups engaged in efforts to gather information about the layout of the U.S. Capitol, as well as the House and Senate office buildings, in advance of Jan. 6, 2021."

On Thursday, Loudermilk for the first time acknowledged that he did bring a "constituent family" into the Capitol complex on Jan. 5, 2021. In a joint statement, Loudermilk and Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.) said that a family meeting "their member of Congress in the House office buildings is not a suspicious group or 'reconnaissance tour.' The family never entered the Capitol building."

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In the letter to Loudermilk, Thompson and Cheney note that Republican lawmakers previously claimed security footage shows in the days before the Capitol attack, there were "no tours, no large groups, no one with MAGA hats on" at the complex, but the committee's evidence "directly contradicts" this. Read more at CNN.