The partner of late U.S. Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick said she holds former President Donald Trump directly responsible for the death of her partner and everyone else who died in connection to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
Sandra Garza appeared on CNN after Trump again dismissed the attack during a speech in Nashville on Friday and claimed that “nobody was killed except a wonderful young woman named Ashli Babbitt,” whom he said was shot for “no reason” in his opinion. (Babbitt and others were attempting to breach a barricaded door inside the Capitol.)
A bipartisan Senate report found that at least seven people had lost their lives in connection with the Jan. 6 attack, including Babbitt, Sicknick and two police officers who died by suicide in the following days.
“I am sick and tired of [Trump] trying to downplay or outright deny that ... Brian did not die as a result of January 6. Because he did,” Garza said. “His cause of death was natural. But that does not mean that January 6 did not play a role in his death.”
Sicknick was assaulted during the riot, collapsed after returning to his office that day and died about eight hours later. Medical officials said he suffered two strokes and died of natural causes, but “all that transpired played a role in his condition.”
“I believe that all of the people that died on that day and the days following, you know, would still be here today had it not been for Donald Trump wanting to mess with [our democracy],” Garza said.
“Donald Trump wanted to step in there and play a higher power ― that’s what I like to call it ― and mess with people’s lives.”
Caroline Edwards, the first U.S. Capitol Police officer injured in the attack, spoke at the June 9 hearing of the House committee investigating the attack, describing the scene on the day as “carnage” and an “absolute war zone.”
“[Officers] were bleeding, they were throwing up. ... I saw friends with blood all over their faces, I was slipping in people’s blood,” she said.
She recalled seeing Sicknick “with his head in his hands” and looking “ghostly pale” after being hit with what prosecutors later determined was pepper spray.
The Jan. 6 committee’s hearings have laid out evidence from testimony and documents that indicate Trump and his allies intentionally lied that the 2020 election was stolen while knowing those claims to be false, ultimately inspiring a mob of Trump supporters to ransack the Capitol in an effort to stop Congress from certifying the results.