FBI sent 55 agents to the Capitol Jan. 6, none for ‘crowd control,’ former Chief Steven Sund says

The FBI called U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund just after 3 p.m. on Jan. 6 to offer help from its SWAT teams, but the number of agents the FBI sent to the Capitol was just 55, Sund told Blaze News.

The FBI’s Washington Field Office was receiving calls from frantic members of Congress holed up in their Capitol offices after crowds breached the building at 2:12 p.m. Assistant FBI Director Steven D’Antuono, head of the Washington Field Office, called Sund just after 3 p.m. and offered help, the former Capitol Police chief said.

‘They’re not trained for it — the plainclothes guys.’

Sund said he does not understand FBI Director Kash Patel’s assertion that 274 special agents were deployed to the Capitol primarily to do “crowd control.”

He said FBI special agents wearing body armor would not be properly outfitted for crowd control.

“They’re not equipped for crowd control. They’re not trained for it — the plainclothes guys,” Sund said. “I don’t even know what training their tactical guys have, but at least they’d be a little bit better equipped with possibly tactical helmets and gas masks.”

Sund said while compiling figures from his call for mutual aid, he tallied the count from the FBI at 55 special agents.

“That evening we were calculating what resources had come in,” he said. “And the number I've been given all along was 55 from FBI.

“So the 17 or more law enforcement agencies that ended up coming in — I think it added up to 1,764 officers — included 55 from the Washington Field Office of the FBI. I had to get that number from somewhere. The 55 is a lot different than 274.”

Sund said he coordinated the effort with FBI Deputy Director David Bowdich.

“So I said, ‘Yeah, I’ll take whatever help you can send,’” Sund recalled. “He said, ‘We’re going to send over our WFO SWAT team, but he is going to send them directly to where the members of Congress [are].’ And I said, ‘No, let’s not do that. Let’s have you come to Lot 16, and that way I can put you with a Capitol Police officer.’”

A leaked report from the House Select Subcommittee to Investigate the Remaining Questions Surrounding January 6 said 274 FBI special agents deployed to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

Some of those agents responded to the scenes of pipe bombs found at the Republican National Committee and Democratic National Committee, the report said. Director Kash Patel said the 274 agents were sent mostly to do "crowd control" after a riot was declared at 2:20 p.m.

Just before the call from D’Antuono, Sund called the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments to request law enforcement mutual aid. The National Capital Region Mutual Aid Agreement was activated, followed by a Regional Incident Communication and Coordination System message that alerted agencies over a multistate area, Sund said.

RELATED: FBI Jan. 6 report sets off a firestorm: Why did it take 56 months to disclose 274 agents at Capitol?

FBI SWAT teams patrol the U.S. Capitol and adjacent office buildings before a joint session of Congress reconvened on Jan. 6, 2021.Photo by Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images

Nearly 1,800 officers responded to the Capitol as a result. The New Jersey State Police reached the U.S. Capitol before the D.C. National Guard. The Guard was delayed by three hours, 19 minutes due to resistance and interference at the Pentagon, a House investigation found.

By 3:06 p.m., tactical teams from the FBI, ATF, U.S. Marshals, U.S. Park Police, U.S. Secret Service, Capitol Police, and other agencies were sweeping the Capitol to find and eject any remaining protesters. That effort started on the top level of the Capitol and moved down, according to security video.

‘The number I’ve been given all along was 55 from FBI.’

The major SWAT response was prompted in part by the 2:44 p.m. shooting of Ashli Babbitt in the hallway outside the Speaker’s Lobby.

After he shot Babbitt, Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd made a false radio report, claiming he was taking fire and was prepared to fire back. Byrd never corrected his statement over the radio. He was never fired upon, and the only shot fired in the Capitol on Jan. 6 was the one he fired, killing Babbitt.

Capitol Police security video shows that an FBI tactical team pulled up in the House Plaza parking lot in an armored vehicle at 2:32 p.m. The SWAT team entered the Capitol’s South Doors at 2:53 p.m., just minutes after an ATF tactical team.

The FBI declined a request for comment from Blaze News.

Sund said at about 6:05 p.m., while walking to brief U.S. senators with Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger, he noticed 20-25 members of what he believed to be the FBI Hostage Rescue Team.

“It could have been their SWAT team, but it sure looked like they were highly equipped, and it looked like their hostage rescue team,” he said.

RELATED: Senate sergeant at arms who oversaw January 6 found dead

Tactical teams from the FBI and U.S. Secret Service stage in a hallway at the Hart Senate Office Building at 7:02 p.m. on Jan. 6, 2021.U.S. Capitol Police CCTV

The HRT is not part of the Washington Field Office. Based in Quantico, Va., the HRT is the FBI’s only full-time tactical team, ready at all times for high-risk missions including counterterrorism.

Capitol Police security video shows FBI special agents wearing body armor securing the hallways of House and Senate office buildings as members of Congress prepared to resume their session on the 2020 election results after 8 p.m. on Jan. 6.

Sund was forced to resign by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) right after Jan. 6. While Pelosi and others sought to place blame for Jan. 6 on Sund, his testimony before various investigative bodies over more than four years has established that it was Pelosi, generals at the Pentagon, and former Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy who created the disastrous delay in deploying the National Guard.

“[Gen.] William Walker had testified if he had been given an authorization right away when I first reached out to him, he thinks he could have had people there before they breached the Capitol, which would’ve been huge,” Sund said.

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