(1) BLM activist John Sullivan was not a Trumpist, yet participated in Storming of Capitol(2) Young men who scaled the walls had trained for such an event - Jeff Blankfort(3) BLM activist John Sullivan says Antifa were not at the Capitol(4) NYT publishes a commentary on John Sullivan's video of Storming of Capitol(5) 'We accomplished this shit. We did this together. Fuck yeah! We are all a part of this history'(6) John Sullivan, a.k.a. Jayden X, interview with Rolling Stone(7) In his video, Sullivan can be heard applauding protesters for climbing the wall(1) BLM activist John Sullivan was not a Trumpist, yet participated in Storming of Capitol- by Peter Myers, July 15, 2021A young black man, John Earl Sullivan, who runs an independent BLM-type organization, participated in the storming of the Capitol, and documented it with a 39-minute video (under the name Jayden X).The video is athttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfiS8MsfSF4&feature=youtu.beShooting and Storming Of The US Capitol In Washington DC7 Jan 2021Jayden XHe captured the shooting of Ashley Babbitt at 35:00.Rudy Giuliani depicted Sullivan as a conspirator who lured Trumpists on. Max Blumenthal depicted him as a covert Trumpist:https://thegrayzone.com/2021/01/12/chaos-agent-right-wing-us-capitol-riot-black-lives-matter/Chaos agent: Right-wing blames US Capitol riot on notorious instigator banished by Black Lives MatterMax BlumenthalJanuary 12, 2021Both are wrong.He did not support the Trumpists' stand on the election or the Culture War. But he opposed the Government, in the spirit of Occupy Wall Street; and, on that basis, revelled in the capture of the Capitol by the people.His commentary in the video includes these lines:"There are so many people. Let's go. This shit is ours! Fuck yeah" ..."I can't believe this is reality! We accomplished this shit. We did this together. Fuck yeah! We are all a part of this history" ...His video shows a lot of riled-up Trumpists, who express awe and reverence at being inside the Capitol. They can be heard urging one another not to damage anything, and they are not shown damaging any of the pictures, statues or historical monuments; the only damage is to doors or windows, for access.The video does not show any Antifa-types such as Michael Yon showed at https://youtu.be/4bIeKj7fZ8U. There are a few people with backpacks, but they are of varied colors and not very full.Item 7 below, from the Epoch Times, wrongly says that Sullivan "was later heard encouraging protesters to climb a wall". In fact, during the video, Sullivan notices that some of the protestors are scaling the wall of the Capitol, and applauds them, but they were climbing it already, before he noticed, so he is not a causal agent in this matter.(2) Young men who scaled the walls had trained for such an event - Jeff BlankfortSubject: Re: Yon distinguishes ordinary Antifa from those who led Capitol  breakin; link with Occupy Watt St?From: Jeffrey Blankfort <jblankfort@earthlink.net>Peter, From its very inception, I have considered Antifa, a government/police sponsored operation, a successor to the Black Bloc of the late 1990s and early 2000s who "uniform" and MO were the same and who managed, despite the damage they do and their "attacks" on the police, are seldom arrested which should raise more curiosity than it has. Als o curious is that these "experts" on fascism, never take a stand on US foreign wars or against US imperialism.Long before the Proud Boys appeared on the national scene, Antifa began by breaking up meetings in Berkeley, organized by legitimate campus right-wing groups hosting notable right-wing speakers, such as Yiannopolis (sp) and then Ben Shapiro, formerly with Breitbart. Not protesting outside which would not have been unusual, but breaking up the meetings, fascist style. It occurred to me  that these meetings were scheduled on the UC campus in order to guarantee such an attack and suppression of the events. Not surprisingly, they became heroes to those lacking in critical thinking.I watched those young men scale the walls. Whether or not they were Antifa--they were not dressed in Antifa's typical garb, they certainly demonstrated that they had trained for such an event, either in the service or as a member of a militia. Of course, that is quite apart from Trump having called on people at the rally to head to the Capitol and stop what he claimed, was a stolen election, without a shred of evidence. No court, even those presided over by judges he appointed, gave his appeals any credibility.We are living in interesting times.Jeff(3) BLM activist John Sullivan says Antifa were not at the Capitolhttps://www.deseret.com/utah/2021/1/7/22219733/utah-activist-inside-u-s-capitol-says-woman-killed-was-first-to-try-and-enter-house-chamber-sullivanUtah activist inside U.S. Capitol says woman killed was first to try and enter House chamberJohn Sullivan claims he entered Capitol during rally only to document event, but his own video shows him encouraging others as they riotedBy Amy Donaldson and Brittany GlasUpdated Jan 8, 2021, 10:59am MSTSALT LAKE CITY — A Utah activist who faces criminal charges in connection with a Provo protest he organized in June claims he attended a pro-Trump rally that turned into a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol in order to see "the truth" about the protests for himself and the organization he represents."For me, it's important from the group and the people around me to see that side of things, to see the truth," John Sullivan said Wednesday night. "I don't care, like what side you're on, you should just see it raw."Sullivan, who is the founder of Insurgence USA, a social justice group that calls itself anti-fascist and protests police brutality, was detained by Washington police for about an hour and a half Thursday night, a day after he talked to local and national media about what he witnessed Wednesday.He was handcuffed the entire time, and said police questioned him about being inside the Capitol and witnessing the shooting death of one of the protesters. He was not arrested.Sullivan said he also intended to "support the Black community" with his attendance, but also feels it was "important to understand" those who were protesting in support of President Donald Trump.But some of the 40-minute video he posted to his social media sites contradicts his assertion that he and another woman were "only filming" the actions and not participating as he can be heard in the video encouraging people to join them as they push their way through police barricades.Just after people broke into the building, Sullivan — wearing a gas mask and wielding an iPhone on a stabilizing stick — and a woman who said Wednesday that she was making a documentary on Sullivan, are on the first porch area outside the entrance looking back over the throngs of people around the Capitol. They can be heard encouraging people to climb the wall, saying, "Come on. Let's go!"Others, wearing Trump gear and carrying various flags, are shouting the same and helping people over the stone or marble railing around the section of Capitol steps.He can be heard saying, "We're all part of this (expletive) history" as they enter the rotunda around 15 minutes in, and he says to his companion, "2021! (expletive) This is insanity. I am shook. What is this? What is this painting, you know? King (expletive) bro (expletive)!"He exchanges social media information with another man, and then he and the filmmaker talk about what they're witnessing."Is this not going to be the best film you've ever made in your life?" he says. "Dude, I was trying to tell you. I couldn't say much."Sullivan said he followed online conversations about Wednesday's protest, which coincided with a rally by the president and the counting of the country's electoral votes in a joint session of Congress. That largely ceremonial act was interrupted Wednesday afternoon when hundreds of protesters pushed past Capitol Police and metal barricades, broke out windows and smashed open doors to gain entry into the building.On Friday, Sullivan insisted that he didn't encourage violence or vandalism.When asked about some of the things he said during the 40-minute video, he said, "When you're in a massive crowd like that, you have to blend in."The riot was not an impromptu act, Sullivan said."As far as them storming the Capitol, I knew that was going to happen," he said. "I'm on chats that are underground that are sending out flyers that are just like, 'Storm all Capitols on the 6th.' It wasn't anything that was secret. It was something that was out there ... and they did it."After making his way inside the Capitol during the riot, Sullivan said he witnessed the shooting death of protester Ashli Babbitt, and the Twitter account for Insurgence USA retweeted video from someone with Sullivan that shows the shooting and the aftermath."I have video of it," he said, describing in detail seeing the flash of the gun, the bullet strike Babbitt, and Babbitt's reaction as she died there on the floor. "I am hesitant to post it. ... It's something I have to take in. I hope that people get a grasp of that situation. Whoever shot her, maybe should be held accountable. I guess that's up to the law to decide."He claims Babbitt was the first one to try and get inside what he believes was the House chamber."There was a glass wall, and she, the woman, was the first person to actually try to get inside," Sullivan said. "All you see is hands come out the doorways with their guns. ... You don't see their face, nothing. And I literally yell at everybody else, 'There's a gun! There's a gun! Don't go in there!' And a shot goes off. And she gets shot as soon as she goes through."The shooting of Babbitt is near the end of the video and is not edited or obscured. Capitol Police move away from the doors before several people use a variety of objects to try and break through the glass windows on the doors. Chairs stacked in front of the doors are visible through the glass.Throughout the video Sullivan can be heard telling police that they shouldn't try to stop them from going different places because he doesn't want them to get hurt. He appears to take his gas mask off at one point, but he is not shown in his own video except for a few seconds of an 18-minute video that has now been removed from his social media accounts. The shorter video appears to include what led to the start of the 40-minute video and most of it is the same.In the wake of widespread condemnation, including from some lawmakers who support Trump and had planned to object to the electoral votes, there were assertions that those who stormed the Capitol, fought with police and injured officers, ransacked offices, and damaged public property, were actually members of groups like antifa or Black Lives Matter. In fact, Sullivan's picture was circulating on social media as "evidence" that the rioters were not Trump supporters.Sullivan said that while he is not a Trump supporter, he claims he wasn't there to join the protest, only to listen and document, and he saw no one else that aligned with his ideology in the crowd."I was probably the only person that supported BLM (Black Lives Matter)," he said. "I could say, from my knowledge ... there were just seas of Trump supporters, Proud Boys."He said some of what they were yelling were insults about antifa and Black Lives Matter.At several points in the video, crowds chant, "Stop the Steal!" a term initiated by one of Trump's allies and his attorneys, and also "We want Trump!"When he was asked if he was a member of antifa, as he has used the hashtag in his social media posts, Sullivan said he understands where there could be confusion."If people are saying I'm antifa, as far as a terrorist organization, I'm not," he said. "Am I anti-fascist? We all are anti-fascist. And that's what we should all strive for being. I have my own organization, Insurgence USA, and that's what it is for. That's really what it is."He said the protesters who stormed the Capitol were all ages and genders, and his video confirms this. Police can be seen helping some of those who are older or who have been injured in the pushing and shoving of the crowd."There were kids, there were women, there were old, old men," he said, "and they were all participating in this insurrection at the ... Capitol. ... It should awaken you to the anger that people might have that's seriously, you know, a problem. And maybe they need to address it."At about 17 minutes into the 40-minute video, someone yells, "Do not deface the statues!" Sullivan can be heard saying, "I can respect that. Well, people might burn this down, not going to lie. Might be too late for that."A minute later he narrates what he's filming with his personal feelings, "This is surreal. This is real life, though. This seems like a movie. ... This is a revolution. You guys treasure this moment. This is history."On Friday, Sullivan acknowledged that he was afraid at some points, but he denies trying to incite violence. In fact, he insists he was only trying to diffuse situations he saw as potentially volatile.Sullivan, 26, faces two criminal charges stemming from a protest he organized in Provo last June.Charging documents say Sullivan recorded several hours of the protest and is seen in the recordings "kicking vehicles and threatening drivers" and directing protesters to block intersections.During that protest, a Provo man, 60, was shot in the elbow after protesters blocked his vehicle. Sullivan later admitted to police that he knew who the gunman was but failed to report it to authorities, according to the charges.(4) NYT publishes a commentary on John Sullivan's video of Storming of CapitolThis is a departure from the Times' usual depiction of the demonstrators as fascists. That people like John Sullivan participated with enthusiasm shows a different side to the events - one that harkens back to Occupy Wall Street - Peter M.https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/13/opinion/capitol-attack-war.htmlWhy the Capitol Riot Reminded Me of WarI watched the video with my heart in my throat — the rage, the chaos and destruction for the sake of spectacle. It reminded me of battle.By Elliot AckermanMr. Ackerman, a former United States Marine and intelligence officer, is a contributing opinion writer.Jan. 13, 2021Ever since I returned from our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, people will from time to time casually ask me what combat is like. Typically, I'll direct them to films like "Full Metal Jacket" and "Black Hawk Down," which, in my opinion, do a pretty good job of capturing something of the experience. Now I have another film I might recommend.Not long after the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol, a video began circulating among veterans I know. It is a roughly 40-minute continuous shot that moves from the breach on the western staircase of the Capitol to the shooting of one of the rioters, Ashli Babbitt, an Air Force veteran, outside the Speaker's Lobby. When sending it, many of the veterans asked, "What does this remind you of?" I watched with my heart in my throat — the exhilaration of the participants, the chaos of a historic event playing out around you, the violence and latent presence of madness; it reminded me of combat.I say this not to draw a political equivalency between insurrectionists and men and women in uniform — though some of the insurrectionists have turned out to be veterans — but rather to place a focus on the level of insanity we witnessed last Wednesday. Anyone who has been to war can tell you that no matter how honorably it is conducted, it is an exercise in collective insanity, where norms of civilized behavior melt away as you engage in the act of state-sanctioned killing.The video I watched was made by a young man identifying himself as John Sullivan who goes by the moniker "Jayden X" online. His commentary runs throughout the video. After breaching the first line of barricades, he says breathlessly, "I can't believe this is reality! We accomplished this …! We did this [expletive], together!" And then: "This is [expletive] history!"  That sense of being part of history and the attendant thrill in Mr. Sullivan's voice is certainly something that I experienced in combat.I remember the first night of the battle in Falluja — thousands of Marines advancing into the city, jets swarming overhead and dropping their ground-shaking ordnance, and the knowledge that I was part of something that, for a moment, held the entire world in its thrall, surrounded by people who were also a part of it. We did this together. Yes, we certainly did, but we didn't yet know the full implications of what we had done and how it would echo in our own lives and the lives of others, for years and decades to come. Violence has a long tail.Within minutes of the first breach, the crowd pours into the Capitol. On entering an opulent conference room, Mr. Sullivan asks himself, "What reality is this?" Then, along with a crowd, he rushes into the Rotunda, and his advance is stalled as if he has hit an invisible wall. He and others are stupefied by what they see: the gilded dome above their heads, the statuary and paintings along the walls. While Trump supporters meander around him, he shouts, "What is this? What is life?" A woman, who has been filming him as he is recording her, stops and says, "I'll give you your hug now." They embrace and congratulate each other. Mr. Sullivan tells her to watch his YouTube channel, and she says, "You weren't recording, were you?" and he assures her that he'll delete their exchange.Throughout the video, the elation of the insurrectionists is juxtaposed with the horror of the Capitol Police officers, who know they're overwhelmed and continually seem to be falling back. This vacillation — between horror and ecstasy, not only within groups but also within individuals, attends the madness in every war, and it is the defining characteristic of this video.Within minutes, Mr. Sullivan has pushed to the head of the crowd, which is closing in on the main legislative chambers. When they approach locked doors, he is quick to volunteer his knife to pry them open (though it is never used). Eventually, the crowd stalls at a bank of glass-paneled doors marked "Speaker's Lobby." Law enforcement has barricaded the corridor with office chairs and desks. Mr. Sullivan urges the police officers to step away, warning them that they're only going to get hurt. As the crowd continues to break sections of the glass, Mr. Sullivan sees an officer aiming a pistol at the mob on the other side of the doors. He shouts, "There's a gun!"For 14 seconds, his camera holds steady on the gun aimed at the rioters. He doesn't run away or push anyone else away. He simply repeats, "There's a gun!" over and over. It's as if the experience has left him unclear whether this is real or a dream, unable to imagine he might be the one about to get shot. Violence, up close, is surreal. Your mind struggles to comprehend its own fracturing, and so the response to the most threatening forms of danger often isn't terror. It's stupefaction, wonder, a sense of "Wow, look at that."Mr. Sullivan survives this altercation. But Ashli Babbitt does not. When a glass panel on one of the doors is completely broken, she climbs through and is shot in the neck, collapsing backward onto the floor. The video is graphic, and Mr. Sullivan is right there. His camera finally turns off as she lies dying at his feet.After watching the video, I felt depleted. We have, each in our own way, tried to make sense of what happened politically, with impeachment proceedings underway and bipartisan condemnation of the siege on the People's House. However, a solely political response to what occurred is insufficient. It requires an emotional understanding as well.In a follow-up video, Mr. Sullivan, who describes himself as a supporter of Black Lives Matter, explains that he believes in "recording these situations and allowing people to see it for what it is." Yet it is hard to square his professed politics with his actions in the video, in which he is clearly a participant, trying to help rioters penetrate more deeply into the Capitol. Right-wing conspiracy theories assert that radical left-wing elements incited the storming of the Capitol. I don't bring up Mr. Sullivan's stated group affiliation to lend credence to those theories, but rather to show that there is a political incoherence that characterizes events like this. It's the same in war.Mr. Sullivan's political rationale for why he stormed the Capitol lasts 20 minutes and is opaque, at best. But his emotional rationale is crystal clear: "Who doesn't want to be there for the action, right? Who doesn't want to see a bunch of Trump supporters just [expletive] up the Capitol? … That's why you watched it. You watched it as an action movie."This brand of nihilism — destruction for the sake of spectacle — is ubiquitous in war. We must avoid it. If Americans are to find any meaning in the storming of the Capitol, our leaders must salvage some good from this atrocity. And there is an opportunity to do so. The bonds of those who endure war last a lifetime, and perhaps that's where we might move forward as a country.A photograph from that day of Jason Crow, an Army Ranger-turned-U.S. representative, holding the hand of his colleague Susan Wild as they were trapped in the House chamber speaks to the intensity of what lawmakers of all parties endured. One can only hope that the emotion of that moment might now be harnessed into political action and a willingness for lawmakers to work together. Maybe out of this we could see Republican and Democratic collaboration on major legislation in the early days of the Biden administration — on infrastructure, stimulus, immigration — or any of the myriad issues about which petty posturing has fed our endemic political dysfunction. Perhaps it's naïve to be hopeful, but war taught me about the importance of hope.On my way home from my first combat deployment in Iraq, I spent the night in a transient barracks. Graffiti by those returning from combat littered the plywood walls. Scrawled in one corner in black Sharpie was a famous quote by Friedrich Nietzsche: "Anyone who fights with monsters should take care that he does not in the process become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes back into you." I was 24 years old, and those words felt like a revelation. Reading them seemed like a first step in the process of understanding not only what I'd been through, but also this distinctly human practice: war.Watching the storming of the Capitol felt similar to reading those words, not only in that I was understanding some new shade of human darkness, but also that I was gazing at something that, like war, had a certain inexplicable quality: It was gazing right back into me.(5) 'We accomplished this shit. We did this together. Fuck yeah! We are all a part of this history'https://dailycaller.com/2021/01/14/john-sullivan-capitol-ashli-babbit/Feds Charge Left-Wing Activist Who Filmed Shooting Of Trump Supporter At CapitolCHUCK ROSSJanuary 14, 2021Federal prosecutors on Thursday announced charges against John Sullivan, a self-described left-wing activist who recorded the fatal police shooting of a Trump supporter inside the U.S. Capitol last week.Sullivan, the founder of a group called Insurgence USA, which formed in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd, is charged with illegally entering the Capitol, civil disorder, and violent or disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.Sullivan, 26, faces separate charges of rioting and criminal mischief in connection with an incident in Provo, Utah on June 30, 2020, where a person was shot and injured during a protest against police brutality.An FBI affidavit issued against Sullivan on Thursday cites comments he made on video he recorded during the Capitol breach.Sullivan told FBI agents as well as members of the media that he showed up at the Capitol to document the activities of Trump supporters who were protesting the results of the presidential election. But the FBI affidavit indicates Sullivan was acting more an active participant in the riots than as a journalist."There are so many people. Let's go. This shit is ours! Fuck yeah," he is heard saying in the video, according to an FBI affidavit from FBI Special Agent Matthew Foulger."We accomplished this shit. We did this together. Fuck yeah! We are all a part of this history," he also said, adding: "Let's burn this shit down."Sullivan was filming as a Capitol police officer shot Trump supporter Ashli Babbit as she attempted to enter a barricaded section of the Capitol. Babbit, a 14-year Air Force veteran later died.In an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper hours after the fatal shooting, Sullivan acknowledged he was not a Trump supporter, but denied instigating the rioters who stormed the Capitol."I don't want to see people get hurt unnecessarily," he told Cooper.Some Trump supporters have pointed to Sullivan's presence in the Capitol to claim that left-wing activists may have served as agent provocateurs, egging on Trump supporters to break into the Capitol and commit violence.(6) John Sullivan, a.k.a. Jayden X, interview with Rolling Stonehttps://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/ashli-babbitt-shooting-video-jayden-x-maga-riot-interview-1112949/‘I Don't Think She Deserved to Die': Black Activist Who Filmed Ashli Babbitt Shooting Speaks OutActivist and video journalist John Sullivan describes how he captured raw, comprehensive footage of the chaos and violence at the storming of the U.S. CapitolBy TIM DICKINSONAshli Babbitt was killed by Capitol Police as she tried to climb through a broken window into the Speaker's Lobby during the far-right insurrection on January 6th, 2021.John Sullivan, a.k.a. Jayden X, is a civil rights activist and crowdfunded video journalist. On January 6th, he donned a bulletproof vest and embedded himself in the masses that President Trump had incited to storm the Capitol. Sullivan scrambled up scaffolding and repeatedly weaved through a crush of rioters to record clashes between the mob and law enforcement. He emerged with a raw, hour-and-a-half frontline documentary of the day's violent and chaotic events. He captures now-notorious figures from the riot, including the shirtless, face-painted "QAnon Shaman" and the bearded rioter dressed in a grotesquely anti-Semitic "Camp Auschwitz" sweatshirt. Crucially, Sullivan's camerawork captured the shooting of 35-year-old mob member and Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt, who was killed by the Capitol Police while attempting to clamber through a broken window into the Speaker's Lobby off the House floor.(Content warning: Graphic images of Babbit's death begin at the 1:14 mark in the video.)Sullivan's profile is unique: The 26-year-old is a resident of Utah and a former competitive speed skater who participated in the 2018 Olympic trials. He is no fan of institutional politics — "I've never voted," he admits, "because I don't believe in the two-party system" — but he found purpose in the street protests that followed the killing of George Floyd, even founding an activist group called Insurgence USA that fights for racial justice. Sullivan's activism has brought him legal trouble: He faces riot and criminal mischief charges stemming from a BLM protest in Provo, Utah, last June. He says he's also become a target of far-right militants he calls "chuds."How did a slender black man who has previously clashed with Proud Boys within among a crowd of largely white, riotous Trump supporters? Sullivan carried a simple setup: a cellphone mounted on an image-stabilizing gimbal. Fitting into the mob, he says, required mirroring its revolutionary sentiments. "I was worried about people recognizing me and thinking that I was Antifa or, like, BLM or whatever," he says. "The entire time they're yelling, ‘Fuck Antifa! Fuck, BLM.' I'm not saying I'm Antifa, by any means. But I definitely believe Black Lives Matter." Sullivan does more than join in shouts of "USA!" At one point in the footage, he can be heard yelling, "It's a motherfucking revolution, let's take this shit." In another, he claims he has a knife that might be useful in opening a locked Capitol door. Sullivan insists he did not have an actual knife, and he makes no apologies for his tactics: "I had to relate to these people, and build trust in the short amount of time I had there to get where I need to go," he says: "To the front of the crowd to see the dynamic between the police and the protesters, because nobody wants to see the backs of people's heads from a far-off distance."One doesn't need to approve of Sullivan's methods to be gripped by the the front-row view of rebellion that his footage offers. Sullivan says he was floored by the feeble resistance of the police defending the nation's Capitol, saying it was "nothing" compared to what BLM activists encountered when he filmed protests last year in Oregon. "In Portland protests and riots, there's tear gas where you can't even see in front of you," he says. The use of crowd control agents at the Capitol was "anything but that," he says. "It's hard to fathom."Sullivan does not have institutional backing that might insulate a professional journalist from the demands of law enforcement. He says he was detained in D.C. on January 7th and interviewed by law enforcement, who took more interest in him as a witness to Babbitt's killing than as a trespasser in the Capitol. Sullivan spoke to Rolling Stone by phone on Monday from Salt Lake City, just hours, he says, after he'd been visited by the FBI, which demanded a full copy of his footage from that day. "I got a USB drive, plugged it into my computer, and gave it to them," he says, matter-of-factly. "It's either that or they just take my phone."How did you end up in Washington on the day of the riot?I knew about the storming of the Capitol, obviously, for a while. Like probably like four weeks. I didn't know the specific time they were going to storm the Capitol, but I knew it was going to happen on that day. And —Let me stop you there, because a lot of people in America were surprised by what transpired at the Capitol. How did you know that this was afoot?I run my own civil rights organization, and we were already watching the Trump supporters and what they were putting out. So we'd seen this coming for a minute. What prompted me to go out there [to Washington, D.C.] is when I'd seen Trump's tweet about him supporting or condoning the event. When Trump says he's going to be there, I mean, people are going to go make that extra effort. Suddenly it looks like they're planning on storming the Capitol building and they were going to have the numbers to do so. So that's when I knew I had to be there. I went on the 4th, so like two days prior.In your footage, the cops made one pretty effective stand, with the mob fenced in under scaffolding on the Capitol steps. What stands out for you from that stage of the riot?People got really angry and aggressive. I remember this guy grabbing a riot shield from a cop, like literally snatching it out of his hands and beating the cop with it. I was like, "OK, well, that's a new one." I've yet to see somebody just grab a riot shield, and nobody does anything, or shoots that person. Once that happened, the crowd got really engaged. And so they just pushed past that line right there. The cops were returning back up to the main Capitol steps onto the balcony. There's another line there with some fences. But I mean, they [the mob] just barged through that with ease. The cops just slapped some of their hands with batons. And then eventually they leave. They just leave. It's not like they were shooting them with pepper bullets or rubber bullets. Just gone. And so then everybody's up on this balcony, like, "We made it." And that's when they start breaching the actual Capitol itself, smashing in the windows and breaking up doors to get inside.Once inside, there's a surreal scene where you walk under the Capitol dome. And then you cross into the House side and film two attempts to breach the House chamber. Did you have a sense of what the motivation was? Did these people want to get in to hurt members of Congress?There was one guy [who] came out — I think I have him on video — and said, "We're just going to go in there and sit down, and sit down calmly, because this is our House," or something like that. So that could be his motivation. As far as the overall motivation of the group, I think a lot of people were there just because they were there. Because Trump said, "Go to the Capitol." No one gave me a sense, specifically, of their action plan past the point of storming the Capitol. I wouldn't know anything of it, other than it being a statement.At one narrow hallway entrance to the House chamber, the crowd is blocked by police who are able to hold the line against them yelling, "Stop the steal!" Can you describe what happened?It was just two cops, just two cops right there. They just wouldn't move. I mean, all the other cops moved, but those cops didn't move. So people were getting angry. They start pushing hard. You can't really feel that in the video. But I'm in this crowd, like shoulder to shoulder, and they're pushing so hard, like thousands of people behind me trying to get people to go forward and go through that door. And it's just not happening, right? And so people finally get angry, and they go out and take a left, go down the hallway to break through a different entryway, which is where you end up at the glass windows, where those officers are guarding those doors.This is outside the Speaker's Lobby, which connects to the House floor.I remember coming up to that and seeing one officer crying, he's a little bit younger. I remember he said, "I want I want to go home and see my kids, man." Not to me, but the officers beside him. And I was like, damn. And that compelled me to say, "Hey, guys, like, nobody here is trying to hurt you, they're just trying to get in, you know? We'll make a path for you to get through." I'm not with the crowd, but I'm just trying to help them get out of that situation, talk them through that, because I know from what I saw prior — they literally like stabbed a cop's eye. The crowd were doing all these things that might hurt the police to where they wouldn't go home to see their kids. I just didn't want that to happen, especially because it's this door they [the rioters] really want to get through, and the [full] crowd has not reached us yet. So I tried my best to convince them. And they kind of peeled off to the right and get out of there.This is when the shooting occurs. Can you take us through what happened next?At that moment, everybody starts rushing the doors, just bashing the windows. And I remember just seeing, like, five or six guns just poke out of these doorways. I really took notice of the one to the left of me in the video. And I just remember screaming, "Gun, there's a gun! There's a gun! Guys, there's a gun!" But what you can't really understand is that nobody can hear me, right? Its like if you're in a concert where everybody's yelling and screaming and singing along. It's so loud you can't hear the person next to you. That's how it was in there. So I'm saying, "There's a gun, there's a gun, there's a gun!" And all these people are still banging on the window. They just keep doing it.What was Babbitt doing?By no means did I see her bash in a window or even break the windows. Somebody else did that, for sure. But then all of a sudden, I see her start trying to climb through the window, and I'm like, "Don't go in there, don't go in there," but I know she could not hear me. So my thought was to get that moment on camera. I wanted to show the gun firing, and the bullet hitting her, and how she dropped to the ground. All of this is going through my mind at that moment, because I knew that this was going to be the only record of how she would have died. Because I knew she was going to die. The guy who was pointing a gun at her was leaning with an intent to shoot; he was not playing. There's difference between holding a gun up and warning somebody versus, like, really leaning into it. I was like, all right, I'm going to show the world why she died. And I'm not going to let her death go in vain. Because I didn't think that she deserved to die. She didn't have a weapon. She didn't have anything. This is what I'm thinking about in this moment, in this small sliver of time.I remember she dropped to the ground, and I don't think that's the part I was ready for. That was emotional for me. I remember just like looking into her eyes, like she was staring at me. She's just staring straight at me, and I just see her soul leave her body, just the light just leave her eyes. I felt a lot of anger, I felt a lot of sadness and sorrow, frustration. I don't think I could ever have prepared myself for it. This was the first time I saw somebody die. I'm still trying to deal with it.The footage is really difficult to watch. And then, just a few moment later, a different law-enforcement group in tactical gear arrives. Is that the end of things?At that point, people just kind of calm down, and they get pushed out by these riot cops that come out of nowhere from behind us. They just start storming the building and throwing out all the protesters. They started funneling all of us out. But as we exit the building there, a huge fight breaks out between a handful of protesters and like all these riot cops. I mean, a fight — a fistfight. The cops are fighting to get them out the door, they throw them out. They don't arrest anybody. They throw them out of the building, close the doors.What did you do next?I guess it didn't really end there for me. Everybody knew I had this footage. And they're coming up to me, like, "Did you get the shot? Can I see it?" I showed a few people, I think they were just other reporters. And they definitely did me the courtesy of telling me, "Get out of there, because, people are going to probably try and take that from you."[Before I left] I actually got called out by some Trump supporter with a megaphone, who was like, "Are you Antifa?" And I was like, "Uh, no." He's like, "You look like you're dressed like Antifa." And, yeah, I would say I definitely look a bit like Antifa: I'm dressed in all black and I had a bulletproof vest on as well, and a gas mask hanging from that. And I thought I was about to get fucked up by a whole bunch of Trump supporters and Proud Boys, whoever else was out there, because hella people surrounded me at that point. I was like, "All right, I got to defuse this situation, or I'm just going to be in some pain." And so I start talking to him like, "Hey, I'm just here to record," And he asks me, "What do you believe?" And I'm like, "Well, I'm very just anti-government." He's like, "Oh, OK. Well, that's a very Antifa thing to say." And I was like, "Well, you know, you say you believe in voter fraud, right? Well I've never voted in my life, just because I don't think my vote counts." He's like, "Oh, OK, OK. Sorry." I was like, "Dude, that's fucked up." I made him feel real guilty about it.Have there been repercussions since the day of the riot?The next day I get detained by the police, and the FBI does bring me in for questioning. Obviously, I've seen somebody get killed, and I was there at the Capitol. They want to know why I was there. I mean, that's the question that comes up. But they released me, so nothing crazy. A lot of it just centers around the shooting footage. They know I have the footage, yeah. So they want that. They want to have the original files, too. So they're going to get that too. They don't just want to pull it off YouTube or anything like that.And did you get them the original files?Oh, yeah, yeah. They showed up to my house. The FBI showed up to my house. Probably like two hours before you called me, they showed up today and took the footage.But you didn't feel like they were after you?I haven't done anything incriminating. If they were after me, I'd already have been arrested. That's for sure.(7) In his video, Sullivan can be heard applauding protesters for climbing the wallThis article from Epoch Times wrongly says that Sullivan "was later heard encouraging protesters to climb a wall". In fact, during the video, Sullivan notices that some of the protestors are scaling the wall of the Capitol, and applauds them, but they were climbing it already, before he noticed, so he is not a causal agent in this matter - Peter M.https://www.theepochtimes.com/black-lives-matter-activist-who-stormed-capitol-on-jan-6-arrested-charged_3657333.htmlBlack Lives Matter Activist Who Stormed Capitol on Jan. 6 Arrested, ChargedBY ZACHARY STIEBER January 14, 2021 Updated: January 14, 2021The Black Lives Matter activist who was seen storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 was arrested and charged, the Department of Justice said Thursday.A newly released court filing says John Earle Sullivan, 26, told FBI agents last week that he was at the Capitol when the breach happened. He said he entered through a window that had been broken out. He also said he was present when Ashli Babbitt, an Air Force veteran, was shot dead by a U.S. Capitol Police officer as she tried to climb into the House Speaker's Lobby through a window.Sullivan showed agents some of the footage he captured inside the building, which he and others entered illegally.Videos showed Sullivan and others breaking through a barricade, with the Utah man shouting: "There are so many people. Let's go. This [Expletive] is ours! [Expletive] yeah. We accomplished this [expletive]. We did this together. [Expletive] yeah! We are all a part of this history. Let's burn this [Expletive] down."He was later heard encouraging protesters to climb a wall to get to an entrance to the Capitol and was seen entering the building.During one conversation with others while inside, Sullivan said, "We gotta get this [expletive] burned." At other times, he said, among other things, "it's our house [expletive]" and "we are getting this [expletive]."Sullivan told U.S. Capitol Police officers to stand down so that they wouldn't get hurt, according to the court filing (pdf). He joined the crowd trying to open doors to another part of the Capitol, telling people "Hey guys, I have a knife" and asking them to let him get to the front. He did not make it to the doors. He later tried to get the officers guarding the Speaker's Lobby to go home, telling them: "Bro, I've seen people out there get hurt."A group of protesters enter the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)Sullivan spoke to a slew of media outlets after the breach, including CNN and ABC. He told The Epoch Times that he took steps to blend in with the crowd so he didn't "get beat up." He said he's known in the activist community as being a member of the far-left, anarcho-communist group Antifa. He denied being a member of the network.He told The Epoch Times he knew of plans to storm the Capitol and that he saw them on "undergrounds chats and things like that." He posted information about the plans on his social media, but didn't inform the law enforcement. "I'm not a snitch," he said.Sullivan has posted in support of Black Lives Matter. He leads a group called Insurgence USA, which says it was founded in the wake of the death of George Floyd, a black man, in police custody in Minneapolis last year."The lack of care for the human life was unacceptable so we set out to end police brutality. We then set out to empower and uplifting black and indigenous voices," the group's website states.Sullivan was charged with rioting and criminal mischief in Provo, Utah, based on his activities around a protest last year in which a person was shot and injured.Sullivan was charged this week with unlawful entry, disorderly conduct, and attempted obstruction of law enforcement. He faces jail time if convicted.Petr Savb contributed to this report.