A year after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, some Horry conservatives try to rewrite history
One year after pro-Trump rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol building in Washington D.C. in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, South Carolina politicians across the political spectrum marked the day earnestly.
Sen. Lindsay Graham, in a series of tweets, called the riot “a dark day in American history,” and added that “it would have been so easy for terrorists to boot strap onto this protest and wreak even further destruction on the U.S. Capitol.”
Rep. Tom Rice (R-Myrtle Beach), said Jan. 6 “continues to live in American history as the day we nearly lost the country our Founders fought for and left for us to preserve.”
And Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-Charleston) called the riot “a day of discredit and disgrace, and a test to see if this generation rises to the occasion and protects the integrity of this Democracy” and compared the attempted insurrection to the WWII attack on Pearl Harbor.
But at a small protest along U.S. 501 at the intersection of Carolina Forest Boulevard, a group of Horry County conservatives held signs, cheered and said they disagreed with the official history of Jan. 6.
That history, based on contemporaneous reporting, is this: Following President Joe Biden’s victory in the November 2020 election, Donald Trump and his supporters began falsely claiming the election was fraudulent and that he was the true winner. Those claims were not true, but many Trump supporters chose to believe them. Between November and January, Trump began an effort to overturn the election, which included multiple lawsuits, calls to the Georgia Secretary of State and rallies where he repeated his false claims. On Jan. 6, the day Congress was set to officially certify the 2020 election results, Trump gathered his supporters near the White House and said, “if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore,” and “we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue...we’re going to the Capitol.”
Following that speech, Trump’s supporters did go the Capitol where they eventually broke through police barricades and into the building, causing damage. One protester, Ashli Babbitt, was shot and killed by Capitol police. Several Capitol police officers died in the days following the riot.
Law enforcement officials, politicians and others have concluded that the aim of rioters breaching the Capitol was to overturn the election and put Trump back in power. Politicians like Rice have said they believe rioters would have harmed or killed lawmakers had they had the opportunity.
But Horry County conservatives disagree.
Holding a series of signs that read, “What really happened Jan. 6?” the 20 conservative protesters said they don’t believe the riot was an attempted insurrection, that Trump wasn’t to blame for what happened, and that politicians and the media have used the events of Jan. 6 to persecute “patriots.”
“The media portrays it as terrorists that ran over our country to destroy it. That’s the furthest from the truth, it was not terrorists, it was patriots with some agitators mixed in,” Lonny Bryant, a Carolina Forest resident who joined the protest, said.
The Horry County protesters weren’t alone. Conservatives in other cities, like Palm Beach, Florida and Washington, D.C., also held pro-Trump rallies to mark the one-year anniversary of Jan. 6. Rallies to commemorate Jan. 6 on the other side of the political spectrum were more common, and held in places like Beaufort County and New York City.
Bryant and others who protested along the highway on Thursday said they suspect federal agents, perhaps working for the U.S. Justice Department, infiltrated the Trump supporters on Jan. 6 and urged them to breach the Capitol and cause damage.
“You didn’t see (Jan. 6) because people went to Washington D.C. to insurrect and take over the government. You saw it because there were instigators to create the situation that they knew was going to get reported the way they wanted it reported. That’s what I think happened,” said Larry Richardson, a former member of the Horry County Republican Party.
To date, no evidence has emerged that government agents instigated or participated in the Jan. 6 riot.
But the protesters had other concerns, too. They said they objected to rioters being held in jail as they await charges related to Jan. 6. And they objected to what they saw as different treatment for Jan. 6 rioters compared to protesters who took to city streets in 2020 during racial justice protests.
“We’re here to support the American people who are being held in jail because of the riot, or the rally, on Jan. 6. They’re still in jail for over a year,” said Linda McHugh, who helped organize the protest.
As the protesters held signs along U.S. 501, heavy duty trucks, tractor trailers and drivers of other vehicles honked their horns in support, prompting cheers among the protesters. At one point, the protesters played Lee Greewood’s “God Bless the USA” over a loud speaker.
Put together, the protest Thursday highlights how controversial the events of Jan. 6 are for conservatives in Horry County and across South Carolina. Congressional Republicans from the Palmetto State, for example, consistently supported Trump prior to Jan. 6, but have fractured in their support since. And Rice, who voted to impeach Trump for his role in the riot, has drawn intense and continuous criticism for the vote, as well as a number of primary challengers looking to unseat him.
The Jan. 6 riot also caused factions within the Horry County GOP that persist a year later. Some longtime party members and former leaders have broken with current leadership and have begun separate organizing efforts. Richardson and McHugh said they are part of one such faction that meets regularly at a local Friendly’s restaurant.
For conservatives like Richardson, the present-day Republican Party is not doing enough to serve conservatives, one reason for the various factions. One thing unifying those conservatives, though, is that Democrats and Republicans alike have overstated the importance of Jan. 6 and the riot.
“The Capitol didn’t get burnt down, the Capitol didn’t get destroyed, but yet they have committees, they have people in jails,” Bryant said. “(Trump) was the vehicle that got a lot of people there to come listen to him but he was not the vehicle that did all the damage, not at all. They were just looking for a scapegoat.”
Richardson said he believes the party should “die” and be replaced by “patriots” who fight for conservative policies and values on the local and state level.
“Personally? My preference? The Republican Party dies on the vine and some patriots stand together unified and don’t have a party and elect individuals to office where the individuals can vote their conscience and their constituents wishes without the party’s influence,” Richardson said. “I think all politics should be local.”
