'We Were Sitting Ducks': Rep. Norma Torres Calls For Arrest Of Capitol Police Chief After Riot
IRVINE (CBSLA) — Rep. Norma Torres, D-Pomona, was inside the House Chamber Wednesday when it was overrun by a pro-Trump mob.
"I was one of 12 people trapped in the balcony," she said. "There was no plan on how to evacuate the members of Congress that were up there with me. We were sitting ducks."
Torres spoke Friday about the terrifying five-hour ordeal.
"We heard the shot being fired," she said. "Being given direction by one officer, one officer with one gun. I don't even think he was wearing a vest."
Safely back home in Pomona, Torres said in a tweet that she was still processing Wednesday's events and "just how close we were to a darker and deadlier outcome."
"We knew that if we were going to come out alive, that we would probably have to fight for our lives," she said.
Torres is now calling for the removal of President Donald Trump and the arrest of Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, who resigned Thursday. She said he initially refused the help of the National Guard and claimed that he failed to arm his officers with riot gear.
"This was an inside job, and he failed miserably," she said. "He should be arrested, not for failing. He should be arrested because he sent out these young men and women, that are there to protect us, without proper equipment without any information as to a real emergency plan."
Torres is also calling for an investigation into the background of all the officers who were on duty leading up to and during the attack on the Capitol.
"Certainly there were officers that are potentially involved in the incident that happened — insiders," she said. "You don't get to find the offices of leadership in the areas where they are, in the hidden areas where they are.
"You don't get to walk around the Capitol the way some of these people did, not just on Wednesday but on Tuesday without an insider letting them in," she continued. "We need to know who those people were, and we need to prosecute them."
