Republicans are accusing Democrats of dodging a key Jan. 6 question. Congress already held hearings to answer it.

House Republicans, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), have frequently suggested that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and her fellow Democrats are dodging the question of why the Capitol Police force was unprepared for the Jan. 6 riot as they try to get to the bottom of the events of that day.

Banks, whom McCarthy recommended to serve on the Jan. 6 select committee before Pelosi rejected him, said Tuesday that if he were at the committee's hearing, he'd ask why the Capitol was "unprepared and vulnerable to attack." He then questioned why Pelosi "would want to block me from asking that question," insinuating that she's responsible for the failures.

But HuffPost's Arthur Delaney thinks Banks' allegations are all for show, noting Wednesday that the prepared question was the first thing "everyone asked" during the hearings. Plus, as Delaney points out, a bipartisan Senate committee held multiple public hearings in an attempt to find the answer.

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Tim O'Donnell

Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.