An eight-inch-long steel pipe with end caps, a kitchen timer, nine-volt battery, and various wires — planted in plain sight under a bench at the Democratic National Committee building — somehow escaped the notice of two U.S. Capitol Police officers who walked right past it 15 minutes after a dispatcher warned of a pipe bomb at the nearby Republican National Committee building.
The plainclothes counter-surveillance officers instead proceeded straight to the Congressional Black Caucus Institute building, a few hundred feet east of the DNC.
‘Was it placed and picked back up and then put back out again?’
One of them stopped at a large bush along the alley that led up to New Jersey Avenue. At 1:03 p.m., the officer backed up, ducked, and peered under the shrub. After a brief pause, he stood back up and continued on the return trek to the DNC. That’s where he discovered the second pipe bomb just two minutes later.
These two bushes are the only ones the officers are seen looking under in the 11 minutes and 14 seconds they’re captured on available surveillance footage. What was significant enough about the bush next to the CBCI building to warrant specific attention? And why has the FBI never disclosed this detail?
A new review of video footage shows that police officers stopped at the exact bush at which, 17 hours earlier, previously released footage shows the hoodie-wearing pipe bomber sitting.
At 7:48 p.m. on Jan. 5, the suspect spent one minute 17 seconds near the bush — first bent over, then sitting down in front of the shrub — Capitol Police security video shows. The suspect rummaged through a backpack while sitting cross-legged, then leaned into the bush and appeared to place or attempt to place something underneath.
The suspect stood up after 77 seconds and walked to the DNC building. There, the suspect sat on a park bench and, at 7:54 p.m., placed a pipe bomb under an adjacent bush, video released by the FBI showed.
A January 2025 U.S. House investigative report said three teams were sent out to look for explosives after a pipe bomb was found behind the Capitol Hill Club at 12:43 p.m. on Jan. 6, 2021.Committee on House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight
In a matter of seven minutes early in the afternoon on Jan. 6, the USCP counter-surveillance team visited the same two venues as the pipe bomber did the night before. While their assigned task was to search for explosives at potential targets around Capitol Hill, the only locations they can be seen on camera searching are the CBCI bush and the bush by the DNC bench, where they found and reported the second pipe bomb.
The significance of the CBCI bush could not have been known to police at midday on Jan. 6.
U.S. Capitol Police counter-surveillance officers walk past the DNC building seven minutes before returning and discovering the pipe bomb. Once the bomb was discovered, the Secret Service acted as if it was not a threat. U.S. Capitol Police CCTV
The bomber’s visit to the first bush and possible attempt to plant a bomb there are one of many details the FBI has never divulged — or even acknowledged.
The discovery was made by an independent video investigator known only as Armitas, who spent more than a year examining details of the Jan. 6 pipe-bomb case. Blaze News has agreed not to print his legal name for security reasons. Armitas has assisted Blaze News in its ongoing Jan. 6 investigations. He has also spoken with congressional and FBI investigators concerning his findings.
New case wrinkles
Armitas alleges that the Biden FBI digitally manipulated the video of the alleged bomber released to the public. The bureau also left out major details in its public disclosures, such as the CBCI bush and the alleged bomber’s visit to the front garden of a congressional rooming house on C Street, near the Capitol Hill Club.
The new wrinkles in the case only add intrigue to the long-unsolved Jan. 6 mystery.
How could officers dispatched specifically to look for explosives around Capitol Hill miss the pipe bomb as they walked past the DNC building at 12:58 pm?
’It was almost like a Keystone Kop comedy show.’
After discovery of the first pipe bomb came across Capitol Police dispatch at 12:43 p.m., their unmarked vehicle sped from 3rd Street Southwest at E Street to the Capitol South Metro lot in under five minutes — with emergency lights on part of the way.
Once parked in the Metro lot, the men spent about three minutes putting on jackets and backpacks and grabbing gear from the hatchback. They set off on foot down First Street to D Street, past New Jersey to South Capitol Street Southeast, then south to the DNC building. They walked seven-tenths of a mile — all the way from the Capitol South Metro Station near the Republican National Committee building.
A two-man Capitol Police counter-surveillance team traveled by unmarked police vehicle and on foot to reach an undisclosed bush where the pipe bomber sat 17 hours earlier.Maps by Armitas/Graphic by Blaze News
It does not appear that the men conducted searches along the way. They stopped briefly near a dark SUV and other vehicles parked on the south side of D Street, directly across a patch of grass from the CBCI bush. Other than that, security video showed, the only locations they stopped to examine closely while on camera were the CBCI bush near the walking path and the DNC park bench.
Some Capitol Police surveillance cameras that normally cover the back of the DNC building were turned away by a command from the control room during this time frame. Because of this, the two plainclothes officers were off camera for three minutes and 54 seconds while they walked from the DNC to the CBCI.
When one of the counter-surveillance officers approached the DNC park bench after visiting the bush at the CBCI, this time he spotted something suspicious. He first reappeared on security video after his walk over from the CBCI at 1:05 p.m., walking to a Secret Service SUV and a Metropolitan Police Department vehicle assigned to the security detail of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
At 1:07 p.m., another Capitol Police officer on scene radioed Capitol Police dispatch:
987Adam: “I’m going to declare a 10-100 [explosive] at the DNC as well, similar device as was found at the RNC as well. Advising the units on scene what’s going on.”
Dispatch: “All right, where do you have your device?”
987Adam: At the DNC.
Dispatch: I copy. … Where at in the DNC, sir?
987Adam: Right on the corner of Canal Street … and Washington Avenue.”
Unknown Officer: “Sir, I need you to repeat. Do we have the same device at the DNC?”
Dispatch: “A-firm sir. … The corner of Canal Street and Washington Avenue in the bushes. 987-A Adam has seen it.”
Attempts by Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) to conduct transcribed interviews of the two officers who discovered the DNC bomb have been blocked by the Capitol Police, Blaze News has learned.
According to the FBI, the DNC bomb sat at the foot of the park bench for 17 hours, escaping the notice of U.S. Secret Service K-9 teams that swept the grounds hours earlier in anticipation of an 11:30 a.m. visit by Harris. Video shows at least two K-9 sweeps of the area after 8:30 a.m. on Jan. 6.
“Why would the dog not hit on a pipe bomb that video shows was placed the night before?” Rep. Loudermilk, chairman of the House Select Subcommittee to Investigate the Remaining Questions Surrounding Jan. 6, asked on Lindell TV. “To me, the only answer to that is the pipe bomb was not there when the dog came by.
“Either it was inert, which, according to the FBI, it wasn’t — it had explosives in it — or it wasn’t there,” Loudermilk said. “But we have video of it being placed. So now we need to know: Was it placed and picked back up and then put back out again? If so, why? Why did they go to that extent?”
‘They were literally letting citizens walk within feet of the supposed pipe bomb.’
Armitas said he believes the DNC bomb placed just before 8 p.m. Jan. 5 was retrieved overnight and replaced shortly before it was found on Jan. 6. The Biden FBI told a congressional investigator the footage on the DNC camera that would have shown any activity throughout the night after the initial bomb placement was overwritten.
On Jan. 5, the suspect appeared to place the pipe bomb with the short end — where a 60-minute kitchen timer was attached — sticking out toward the sidewalk, Armitas said. When the pipe bomb was discovered on Jan. 6, the long end was sticking out, with the kitchen timer pointed into the bushes. Both observations would indicate that the device was removed and later replaced, he said. The camera that would have captured this activity was turned away from the bomb scene.
Secret Service agents drove Harris within feet of the bomb location as her motorcade entered the DNC garage at 11:25 a.m. Why was placement of the DNC device not viewed as an assassination attempt? Harris has never spoken of it. The Secret Service took nearly 10 minutes to evacuate Harris after the bomb was discovered. Why the slow response?
After being told there was a likely bomb just feet away, Secret Service agents sat in their vehicles for more than two minutes, finishing lunch, video shows.
Even when they emerged, their nonchalant behavior was striking. Pedestrians continued to walk on the sidewalk just feet from the bomb. Commuter trains continued to run across the nearby train trestle for 15 minutes. Vehicles drove past unmolested.
Experts have said police should have quickly established a blast perimeter, shut down vehicle and train traffic, and immediately evacuated the DNC building. Loudermilk compared the bomb response to the work of the Keystone Kops, the fictional, bumbling police officers of America’s silent-film era.
“Once the pipe bombs were found, it was almost like a Keystone Kop comedy show,” Loudermilk told Lindell TV. “The police failed to put a perimeter around. They were literally letting citizens walk within feet of the supposed pipe bomb. There was no control. It didn’t seem anyone was in charge. It was really an embarrassment.”
The Secret Service motorcade of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris pulls out of the Democratic National Committee garage at 1:14 p.m. Jan. 6, right past a pipe bomb sitting feet away.U.S. Capitol Police/Graphic by Blaze News
Secret Service agents should never have stood at a doorway just feet from a weapon of mass destruction. One police officer tiptoed up to the park bench to snap a photo of the bomb. A sudden explosion could have killed them all.
The mystery of when the pipe bomb was actually planted at the DNC building could be solved with video from the same DNC security camera that captured the alleged bomber’s movements the night before, except that the FBI didn’t seize it from the DNC when agents obtained Jan. 5 surveillance videos during the early hours of the investigation.
“They encountered a couple of other detectives who had started investigating and said, ‘We have identified the person is this person in the hoodie,’” Loudermilk said in the Lindell TV interview. “‘You need to just look at the January 5 video. So no one obtained any of the video from the 6th. Then apparently all the videos have been overwritten.”
The disappearance of the security video that would solve the case is another suspicious circumstance in a case loaded with them.
Capitol Police security cameras with near-perfect views to the west side of the DNC building were turned by a command from the control room and so did not capture the scene at crucial times on Jan. 5 and also didn’t capture video of the bomb discovery. The FBI has never acknowledged nor commented publicly on the diverted cameras.
Capitol Police security cameras were turned away from the Democratic National Committee building at key times on Jan. 6, preventing documentation of the possible re-planting of the bomb.U.S. Capitol Police/Graphic by Blaze News
The FBI has described the Jan. 6 pipe bombs as “viable,” though even that has since been called into question.
The FBI Laboratory report on the devices said the pipe found at the Capitol Hill Club contained “low explosive black powder.” The DNC device “contained the chemical oxidizer and fuels that, when mixed in the proper proportions, can form the low explosive black powder.”
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive defines black powder as “a low explosive material comprised of potassium nitrate (saltpeter), sulfur and charcoal. While used as a propellant in fireworks and pyrotechnics, it is also used in some ammunition and muzzleloaders.”
Inspector General report
While the Secret Service had bomb-sniffing dogs at the DNC in advance of Harris’ arrival, the K-9s were never taken into the direct vicinity of the park bench, according to a Department of Homeland Security Inspector General report released to the public on Aug. 2, 2024.
“The officer responsible for sweeping exterior areas said that the exterior sweep included the garage entrance ramp and some other areas near the garage entrance, including a storm drain, but did not include the bushes where the pipe bomb was located,” the report said.
‘Apparently all the videos have been overwritten.’
The Secret Service deleted thousands of its agents’ cellphone text messages from Jan. 5 and 6, despite being warned by congressional committees to preserve all Jan. 6-related records.
The Secret Service denied any malicious intent and claimed the purge of text messages was “part of a pre-planned, three-month system migration.” However, the phone wipe began 11 days after the first records-preservation warning letter from Congress, the OIG report said.
The highly critical OIG Jan. 6 report was delayed by Secret Service attempts to stifle its public release, Loudermilk said in August 2024.
Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle “considered asking Secretary [Alejandro] Mayorkas to invoke his statutory authority to block the review in its entirety,” Loudermilk said.
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Crime, January 6