WASHINGTON -- After years of delays, the U.S. Senate will soon hang a plaque honoring the police who defended the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.
"I've been assured from the Leader's office that they're in the final stages of putting it up. Location decided," Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said Monday in an exclusive interview with HuffPost.
Tillis, a leading advocate of the effort, said the bronze plaque will be positioned in a hallway on the Senate side of the Capitol building, and that this is likely to occur sometime next week.
The North Carolina Republican also said he is planning to commemorate the event with a ceremony to honor the hundreds of law enforcement officers who protected the Capitol from a mob of violent supporters of Donald Trump. Approximately 140 police officers sustained injuries that day.
"I intend to plan something around it to remind people, and frankly, to apologize [to] the Capitol Police and everybody that responded that day for taking so long," Tillis said. "It should have never taken this long, and quite honestly, it wouldn't have happened if we didn't make it an issue."
Congress passed a law in March 2022 mandating the plaque be put up, but years went by, and the plaque remained sitting in the basement of the U.S Capitol. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who led the efforts to object to the 2020 election results, argued the project was "not implementable" because of the sheer number of names needed to be listed on the plaque.
Earlier this year, on the fifth anniversary of the attack on the Capitol, the Senate unanimously passed a resolution directing the Architect of the Capitol to display the plaque in the Senate wing of the Capitol until it can be placed in its permanent location on the west front of the Capitol, as directed by law.
Tillis said on Monday the plaque will hang in the Senate with a QR code allowing the public to view a digital list of the names of all the officers who responded on Jan. 6, 2021.
A spokesperson for Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the Senate Rules Committee, which has been working on the location of the plaque, confirmed that it's going up next week.
"After being unjustly stalled by House Republicans, I'm glad to see the plaque honoring the brave women and men who defended the Capitol during the January 6th insurrection finally going up in the Senate. As Ranking Member of the Rules Committee, I will continue pushing to ensure the real story of what unfolded on January 6 is told and that the lives lost are never forgotten."