Louisiana’s Gen. Russel Honoré To Investigate Security Failures At U.S. Capitol

By Wesley Muller Jarvis DeBerry, the Louisiana Illuminator

January 15, 2021

Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré (U.S. Army – Ret.) was appointed to a commission that will investigate security failures during the Jan. 6 pro-Trump riot at the U.S. Capitol that sought to forcibly prevent members of Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory as 46th president of the United States, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Friday.

Pelosi said the investigation will focus on “truth and trust” and encompass any members of law enforcement, security or even Congress who may have been “accomplices to the insurrection” or “aided and abetted the crime.”

Honoré, a native of Lakeland, is most famous for his command of Joint Task Force-Katrina in 2005, which restored order to the mostly flooded city of New Orleans. Honoré retired from the Army in 2008 after 37 years of active service and since then has been a speaker and consultant on the importance of preparedness.

“His focus was military support to civilian authorities,” Pelosi said at a press conference Friday.

He has also been a highly visible presence on cable news television on topics that include environmental justice and the need for a consolidated and assertive response to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

In an interview with WVUE FOX8 in New Orleans two days after the U.S. Capitol was stormed, Honoré said the police force whose job it is to protect the building were not prepared for the violence and that they should have been. He said that some people on that force were not just incompetent but complicit: “Everybody knew they were coming! Every law enforcement agency in D.C. called the capital and said, ‘Hey, how many you want?’ ‘Oh, we don’t need no help. That’s why it was complicit, and people need to go to jail over that.”

In a later interview with MSNBC about his experience as a military officer fighting to protect people from dictators, Honore’ said, “I won’t name the countries, because we’re part of that club now.”

The Louisiana Illuminator is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization driven by its mission to cast light on how decisions are made in Baton Rouge and how they affect the lives of everyday Louisianians, particularly those who are poor or otherwise marginalized.