A plaque will be installed on March 17, 2026, commemorating those who protected the U.S. Capitol during the January 6, 2021 insurrection. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)
WASHINGTON – More than two dozen Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday shined a spotlight on a newly installed memorial plaque to those who defended the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.
The members – led by New York U.S. Rep. Joe Morelle, the top Democrat on the U.S. House Administration Committee – led reporters on a visit to the Honor Roll, which is located on the Senate side of the Capitol near an entrance to the Western Front.
The memorial plaque, quietly Installed at the beginning of March in an area of the Capitol not typically visited by tourists, drew criticism for its lack of public visibility and a three-year delay in installation.
The monument is also at the center of a lawsuit filed by two police officers who defended the Capitol that day.
“This is not a prominent location – the law we passed dictates where the location is – this is not it,” Morelle told States Newsroom.
Trump pardoned
The honor plaque was installed more than five years after the deadly insurrection in which a mob of President Donald Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol to stop Congress from certifying former President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
Trump pardoned him in January 2025 more than 1,500 January 6 Defendant.
Tuesday’s visitors included Speaker Emeritus Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat who was House speaker during the Jan. 6 insurrection and was a target of the rioters.
A law from 2022 requires that a Honor plaque will be installed be erected within one year of its passage and placed “at a permanent location on the West Front of the United States Capitol.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, received criticism for delaying the installation.
Merkley and Tillis are pushing for Senate action
The plaque installation came after the Senate in January unanimously approved a resolution It directs the architect of the Capitol to “prominently display” the plaque in a “publicly accessible location” in the Senate wing of the Capitol “until the plaque can be placed in its permanent location.”
Morelle praised those efforts, led by Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, but said, “This is not a place where visitors will see it,” noting that “tours are not allowed down here” and “this is just an emergency exit.”
The New York Democrat said that if Democrats win back the majority in November, he will do everything he can to “make sure it’s put where it’s supposed to be, where Americans come by, see it and honor the sacrifice of the men and women who defended us that day.”
suit
Meanwhile, Harry Dunn, a former U.S. Capitol Police officer, and Daniel Hodges, a current Metropolitan Police Department officer, sued the architect of the Capitol Delay in installing plaque in June 2025.
Shortly after the plaque was displayed, the two continued to argue March 10th that their lawsuit should continue.
They said the Architect of the Capitol’s “decision to place the plaque in a portion of the Capitol hidden from public view violates the language of the law, which requires the monument to be located on the ‘West Front’ of the Capitol, an exterior portion of the building.”
