Staffers from the office of the Architect of the Capitol on Saturday morning installed a plaque honoring the U.S. Capitol Police and other law enforcement agencies that protected the Capitol building during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot.
"On behalf of a grateful Congress, this plaque honors the extraordinary individuals who bravely protected and defended this symbol of democracy on January 6, 2021. Their heroism will never be forgotten," the plaque reads.
Below the acknowledgement text, the plaque lists all the law enforcement agencies and other entities involved in the response to the attack. The U.S. Capitol Police Department and Washington's Metropolitan Police Department are listed above and separate from the rest.
The installation comes two months after the Senate unanimously agreed to a resolution directing the Architect of the Capitol to install a plaque honoring officers who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6.
The Senate resolution was introduced in January by Sens. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., and Thom Tillis, R-N.C., after Congress had stalled on plans outlined in a 2022 law to install a similar plaque by March 2023.
The 2022 law commissioned a plaque to honor officers who defended the Capitol and directed leaders in both chambers of Congress to oversee and approve the installation. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., a key ally of President Donald Trump, had said that the 2022 law was "not implementable" and had indefinitely delayed the installation of a plaque as described in that law.
The plaque ordered by the Senate resolution was installed on the Senate side of the Capitol. Merkley said in January it would stay there until both chambers could agree on a more permanent place for it.
"It's so important that we fulfill the vision of the 2022 law and get this plaque up to honor those police officers," the Oregon senator said on the Senate floor in January. "What this resolution is saying is we in the Senate will put it up here in a publicly available space until a deal can be reached with the House of Representatives to display it. Both chambers have to agree on that; but to put it up here in the Senate in a place where the public can see it, that we can do here on our own."
Since the start of the second Trump administration, the president and his allies have sought to downplay the severity of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack by his supporters, which happened at the tail end of the president's first administration as he sought to overturn the 2020 election results.
Shortly after he was sworn in last year, Trump pardoned roughly 1,500 criminal defendants who were charged for their actions at the Capitol that day.