Details about the timeline of events and planning leading up to the Capitol insurrection are expected to sharpen as a U.S. House Select Committee continues a series of hearings on Monday morning.
U.S. Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards and British filmmaker Nick Quested testified before Chairperson Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Mississippi, and Ranking Member Rep. Lynne Cheney, R-Wyoming, about what they had witnessed that day during the committee’s first hearing Thursday.
Edwards was the first police officer injured in the attack. Quested had embedded with the Proud Boys, a fraternal white nationalist hate group, for a documentary about rising extremism in the U.S., and had witnessed the group’s plans leading up to that day.
Monday’s hearings are expected to feature witnesses discussing former President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede the November 2020 election and instead spread false claims of fraud about the election’s outcome.
Four Mainers who were in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021, are facing charges for their actions that day ranging from misdemeanor disorderly conduct to felony assault. Another said he had left before the insurrection began.
Nick Blanchard, a Waterville anti-vaccine activist, attended a rally beforehand but said he told FBI agents that he left before the insurrection began.
Here’s what we know about the four Mainers facing charges: Joshua Colgan, Glen Mitchell Simon, Kyle Fitzsimons and Nicholas Patrick Hendrix.
Joshua Colgan
Colgan, of Jefferson, was arrested last month by the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office, making him the fourth person with Maine ties arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 insurrection.
He allegedly pushed his way into the Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021, though he is not accused of behaving violently or assaulting any officers.
Colgan posted on Facebook that he and other rioters were there “to overthrow this corrupt government and to form a new brotherhood of patriots that will be permanently carved into our history books to never be forgotten,” and to “ensure that every innocent boy and girl in this country does not, will not ever grow up in a socialist nation,” according to an FBI affidavit.
Federal prosecutors have charged Colgan with four misdemeanors: entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly conduct in a Capitol building; and demonstrating in a Capitol building.
He faces up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine.
Glen Mitchell Simon
Simon, a Minot native who was arrested in Georgia last year, pleaded guilty last month to disorderly and disruptive conduct after he told a judge that he used a bike rack to push back police officers at the Capitol.
He also pleaded guilty last fall to demonstrating inside of the Capitol. Prosecutors brought additional charges after realizing that he had played a larger role in the riot than previously thought.
Simon, 31, faces eight to 14 months in prison, and will be sentenced in August.
Kyle Fitzsimons
Kyle Fitzsimons, a York County butcher, was arrested in February 2021 at his Lebanon home and initially charged with 10 counts before prosecutors added an 11th charge last month.
He has pleaded not guilty to the counts, which include felonies, ranging from assaulting federal officers to disorderly conduct. He’s been in the D.C. Jail since his arrest and his trial begins Monday, according to court documents.
Fitzsimons allegedly twice charged at a line of Metropolitan Police Department officers who managed to fight him off.
In the years before his arrest, Fitzsimons espoused white supremacist rhetoric, threatened U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree if she voted to impeach former Trump and had two “unnerving” encounters with Maine Rep. Michele Meyer.
He told lawmakers in 2018 that he had moved to Maine to escape “multicultural hellholes,” and that immigrants were “killing off yankee New England culture” and replacing white Americans, parroting a racist conspiracy theory that has motivated several mass shooters.
His attorney has said Fitzsimons was persuaded by Trump’s rhetoric that the 2020 election had been fraudulent, prompting him to travel to Washington, D.C., for the Jan. 6 “Save America” rally where Trump appeared that later led to the Capitol siege.
Nicholas Patrick Hendrix
Nicholas Patrick Hendrix, 35, was arrested in May 2021 after turning himself in to U.S. Marshals.
He allegedly was part of a group that forced its way past police and into the Capitol in an attempt to stop the certification of results from the November 2020 presidential election.
He has been charged with four misdemeanors: knowingly entering a restricted building without authority; disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building; violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds; and demonstrating in any of the Capitol buildings.
He pleaded not guilty and is free on bail.
He will appear later this month in court, on June 27, where he’s expected to either accept a plea deal or go to trial.
If convicted on all four charges, he faces up to 18 months in prison and $105,000 in total fines.
The next committee hearing will take place on Monday at 10 a.m.
