Seditious Amnesia

The Insurrectionists' roll call

On Jan. 3, 2021 a mob, encouraged by then-President Trump, stormed the U.S. Capitol. Responding police officers suffered horrendous injuries and a bipartisan report found that at least seven deaths were connected to the attack. Damage to the Capitol building and grounds is estimated to be almost 3 million dollars.

Watching the live coverage of the attack was horrifying to me because I know that area well. The grounds were part of my regular runs and I spent many years walking the Capitol grounds with a succession of dogs. Any time I went to the museums or downtown for errands I would walk across the lawns and marvel at the beautiful view down the Mall.

While at first most Republicans condemned Trump’s participation and inaction during the riot, it didn’t take long for them to backtrack to Mar-a-Lago. I pitched an idea to the Washington Post for a multi-caricature piece showing all the people involved with the planning and execution of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. With the talents of my design director Chris Rukan and coding genius Yan Wu, this is what we created.

It was a monster to do and I spent the entire week from Christmas to Jan. 2nd finishing just the final. Here are the various stages of the piece and a link to the interactive as well as a photo of the print version. While of course there are changes I’d love to make (including Ginny Thomas for one), I’m happy with it. I hope it leads to more people reading the facts about the attack and also to watch the hearings by the January 6th Committee.