The last time I came to the Capitol I was teargassed in the lobby. This time was even worse
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Four years after reporting from the attack on the US Capitol, Richard Hall returns to watch Donald Trump’s election certified. On this January 6, I entered through that very same door and took a seat in the press gallery above the House Chamber to witness what was always supposed to be a solemn and procedural affair: the certification of the presidential election.
![[The snow-covered US Capitol building is seen through black security fencing on the fourth anniversary of the January 6 attack.]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/06/18/GettyImages-2192657155.jpg)
Instead, Vice President Kamala Harris, fresh off her election defeat, entered the room to polite applause from both sides. She walked past a beaming Marjorie Taylor Greene, the congresswoman from Georgia and perhaps the biggest supporter of the mob that attacked this building four years ago. Laughing throughout, Taylor Greene appeared the happiest person in the room.
![[(L-R) US Senator Deb Fischer, Republican from Nebraska, speaks as US Vice President Kamala Harris and Speaker of the House Mike Johnson look on during of a joint session of Congress to certify the results of the 2024 Presidential election, inside the House Chamber at the US Capitol on January 6, 2025]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/06/18/2192160712.jpg)
Harris stood alongside Speaker Mike Johnson as she announced the start of the count, and dutifully watched over the reading out of each state’s votes. “Madam President, the certificate of the electoral vote of the State of Alabama seems to be regular in form and authentic, and it appears therefrom that Donald J. Trump of the state of Florida received nine votes for president,” and so on, fifty times over.
The senate process was a return to normalcy, but with the heart of the dispute unresolved — like an awkward Christmas dinner with parents who never went to therapy. The count proceeded as it should have done four years ago, but there were plenty of reminders of that day.
The boxes containing the certified Electoral College vote tallies, with their distinctive leather straps, were placed at the Speaker’s podium waiting to be opened. Four years ago, those same boxes were hurried out of the chamber moments before the Capitol rioters reached these doors.
