Capitol Police officials never saw FBI intelligence report of planned attack on US Capitol

Former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund informed lawmakers at Tuesday’s Senate committee hearing that the Capitol Police Department (CPD) received reports from the FBI of a possible violent uprising the night before the attack on the US Capitol, however the reports never made it to leadership. According to Chief Sund, who was certain the CPD didn’t receive information from the FBI, he was informed that the Capitol Police Department received reports the day before the attack just before the hearing Tuesday.

"I actually just in the last 24 hours was informed by the department that they had received that report," he said before Senator Klobuchar and lawmakers. Chief Sund resigned after the January 6 Capitol riot.

Officials with the CPD previously faulted intelligence failures at the federal level for not forecasting the potential escalation of violence at the riot. Paul Irving, the House’s top law enforcement official, said the US Capitol Police’s intelligence compiled from federal reports did not "forecast a coordinated assault" on the Capitol as had happened during the riot, USA Today reported.

The Senate’s top law enforcement official Michael Stenger told Senator Klobuchar that he, along with Paul Irving, did not see the FBI Intelligence reports prior to the riot. Chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Senator Gary Peters (D-MI), slammed the former Capitol Police Chief for the intelligence failures.

"That report had specific information," said Peters, referring to the report which warned that protesters were "preparing for war."

"That raises a big question," the chairman continued. "It does not get to operational command? How could that happen?"

Chief Sund indicated that the intelligence failure was "under review" and the information from the FBI "would have been beneficial." Assistant FBI Director Steven D'Antuono said during a Justice Department briefing on January 12, that the intelligence report, prepared by the bureau's Norfolk, Virginia, office, included a "thread from a message board" that described preparations for a planned assault, including a map of Capitol-area tunnels along with staging areas in US cities.

D’Antuono acknowledged that the information was shared within "40 minutes" with law enforcement partners, including the Joint Terrorism Task Forces and the US Capitol Police.