As 2026 got underway and much of the political world prepared to acknowledge the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, House Speaker Mike Johnson’s office made an announcement: Federal law required Congress to install a permanent plaque to honor the law enforcement personnel who helped protect the U.S. Capitol against insurrectionist rioters, but as far as Johnson was concerned, the statute that authorized the plaque was “not implementable.”

Two months later, in the middle of the night, without fanfare or controversy, he changed his mind, and workers bolted the plaque to a Capitol wall.

It was a step in the right direction, but it wasn’t much of a step. The House speaker’s office allowed the plaque to be installed on a wall in a cellar-like entrance, in a part of the Senate that is not accessible to the public.

Soon, however, as the Republican majority gives way to a Democratic majority, the plaque will find a new home. Politico reported:

Democrats intend to find a more prominent location to display a memorial plaque honoring the law enforcement officers who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — which Republicans currently have relegated to the basement of the building.

Rep. Joe Morelle of New York, the top Democrat on the House Administration Committee, confirmed to Politico he plans to facilitate the move when his party retakes the majority in January. And while he is still working out the logistics, the relocation would send a strong message about how Congress remembers a widely traumatic event that remains politically divisive.

It will be a welcome resolution to a process that’s dragged on far too long.

After the insurrectionist violence nearly six years ago, Congress agreed to install a plaque to honor law enforcement officers, and according to the statute, the plaque was to be placed on the western side of the Capitol by March 2023. The plaque was ready by that deadline, but it instead sat in a Capitol basement utility room surrounded by tools and maintenance equipment.

Three years after the deadline, the Republican House speaker changed direction, but he did so in a way that further outraged some of the officers who clashed with pro-Trump rioters.

At the time, some Democratic lawmakers made clear that the broader fight over the Jan. 6 plaque wasn’t quite over. Now we know that they were right.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

The post Incoming Democratic majority intends to move Jan. 6 plaque to more prominent location appeared first on MS NOW.

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