House Speaker Has One Big Tweak to Jan. 6 Footage

Mike Johnson says he's blurring out faces of Capitol rioters in videos to prevent 'retaliation'
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 6, 2023 10:15 AM CST
Johnson: We're Blurring Faces of Jan. 6 Rioters in Footage
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., meets with reporters at the Capitol in Washington on Nov. 29.   (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Last month, House Speaker Mike Johnson announced he was, as promised, releasing security footage from the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol, assuring Americans they'd be able to "view every minute of the videos uncensored," per CNN. On Tuesday, the Louisiana Republican clarified there would be one bit of censoring: Johnson has decided to shield the rioters seen in the videos before releasing the footage publicly. "We have to blur some faces of persons who participated in the events of that day because we don't want them to be retaliated against and to be charged by the DOJ," Johnson told reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, reports NBC News.

Johnson's spokesman later tweaked that reasoning, shifting concern away from the DOJ. "Faces are to be blurred from public viewing room footage to prevent all forms of retaliation against private citizens from any non-governmental actors," Raj Shah wrote on X. "The Department of Justice already has access to raw footage from January 6, 2021." NBC notes that online detectives have been "an extremely valuable resource in identifying Jan. 6 participants," blowing up photos of individuals from CCTV footage and often using facial recognition technology to try to track them down.

Johnson reiterated on Tuesday that sharing the videos with the public was in the name of "transparency," and that he believed it to be a "critical and important exercise," reports ABC News. "House Republicans trust the American people to draw their own conclusions," he said, adding that the process to blur out the faces was a "slow" and "methodical" one, but that "we're working steadily on it ... and all of those tapes ultimately at the end will be out." (More Capitol riot stories.)

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