Dear reader, Nine months ago, the editors of The New Yorker assigned one of its veteran war correspondents, Luke Mogelson, to cover the increasing tumult on the streets of America. Mogelson has produced a series of astonishing reports, culminating in his latest dispatch, “Among the Insurrectionists,” which vividly documents the attack on the U.S. Capitol and places it among a series of violent and racist rallies that have occurred in Washington, D.C., since the election. For a period of time on January 6th, Mogelson was the only journalist on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and his account of the conversations among the invaders is shocking and surreal. Among other things, he observed an adherent of the white-supremacist Web program “America First” sitting in the chair where, before the riot cleared the Senate chamber, Vice-President Mike Pence had been presiding over the certification of the Electoral College votes. “Donald Trump is the emperor of the United States,” the man declared. As insurrectionists rummaged through the mahogany desks of U.S. senators, one of them declared, of Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas, “Cruz would want us to do this.” It is well worth revisiting some of Mogelson’s other reports from the past year, among them “In the Streets with Antifa,” a clear-eyed dispatch from Portland, Oregon, that documents the battles between antifascists and such right-wing groups as the Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer. “The Militias Against Masks” sheds light on the mind-set of Michiganders—many of them armed—who protested lockdown measures during the spring wave of the coronavirus pandemic. “We’re a trigger-pull away,” one protester warned Mogelson. “We’re getting to the point where people have had enough.” In April, 2020, right-wing groups rallied inside the Michigan state capitol, in Lansing. As Mogelson notes, “Dozens of men with assault rifles filled the rotunda and approached the barred doors of the legislature.” Although no one died, the incident can now be seen as a precursor to the U.S. Capitol assault. In “Among the Insurrectionists,” Mogelson writes that, for many Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol, “the occupation of restricted government sanctums” had become “an affirmation of dominance so emotionally satisfying that it was an end in itself—proof to elected officials, to Biden voters, and also to the occupiers themselves that they were still in charge.” As one of them shouted through a megaphone, “We will not be denied.” —The Editors |
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