US Capitol Riots: Arizona QAnon supporter leads pro-Trump mob

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Some of the members of the violent pro-Trump mob that stormed the US Capitol Wednesday sending the seat of the federal government into lockdown and temporarily halting the certification of Joe Biden‘s victory in its tracks have now been identified.

The heavily-tattooed Trump supporter who sported horns, a fur hat and face paint and occupied the Senate dais moments after Vice President Mike Pence delivered his rebuke to Donald Trump has been revealed to be an Arizona-based QAnon believer who used to promote himself as a singer and actor. 

Jake Angeli, 32, often the QAnon Shaman, has become a fixture at recent right-wing rallies while decked out in his signature attire.

Meanwhile, the insurrectionist who brazenly put his feet on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s desk and ‘scratched his balls’ in her office is now known to be a 60-year-old Arkansas man who claims he will run for Arkansas governor in 2022 and describes himself as a white nationalist online. 

Richard ‘Bigo’ Barnett boasted outside the Capitol following the siege that he ‘wrote [Pelosi] a nasty note, put my feet up on her desk and scratched my balls.’ 

Another looter who smiled for a photo as he made off with a lectern has been named as Adam Johnson – a psychology graduate from Bradenton, Florida. 

Photos on his now-deleted social media accounts show him posing next to a sign reading ‘closed to all tours’ inside the building.  

Dozens of other Trump supporters involved in the siege that resulted in the death of at least one woman are yet to be identified, with someone leaving a threatening note on Pelosi’s desk reading ‘we will not back down’ while only 13 people were arrested. 

Outside the chaos in the capitol, another vocal Trump supporter Leigh Ann Luck, dressed up as the Statue of Liberty as she shouted in protest against Biden’s victory. 

Angeli was at the front of a group of agitators who broke into the Capitol and faced off with DC police who desperately tried in vain to protect the establishment. 

He then made his way into the Senate chamber where he was seen shouting and posing for photos.   

Angeli flexed his left arm as he stood behind the dais in the Senate chamber where just moments earlier Vice President Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi had stood.

He was flanked by an American flag and his fellow rioters took photos of him on their smartphones. 

The ‘Qanon Shaman’ was also seen screaming in the chamber and clutching a megaphone. 

Meanwhile, in Pelosi’s office, 60-year-old Barnett posed for a photo reclining in the House Speaker’s chair before he later returned to the crowd of supporters outside and flashed a hand-written envelope he had looted.  

Barnett later told the New York Times reporter Matthew Rosenberg he ‘fell’ into Pelosi’s office as he showed off the personalized envelope which was addressed to The Honorable Billy Long and had Pelosi’s signature on it.

‘I didn’t steal it,’ he claimed, saying he ‘left a quarter on her desk’.

‘And I left her a note on her desk that says “Nancy Bigo was here you b**ch”.’ 

He also denied storming her office, claiming he politely knocked on her office door and was pushed in by other protesters. 

‘I’ll probably be telling them this is what happened all the way to the DC jail,’ he said.  

Both Angeli and Barnett are vocal supporters of the president and have been spotted at other protests in support of Trump’s repeated unfounded claims that the election was ‘stolen’ from him. 

Angeli has become a prominent figure at pro-Trump rallies, always sporting his signature outfit of fur, horns, face paint and bare chest, where he has spouted off about QAnon conspiracy theories. 

Most recently he has been active at Arizona rallies calling for the results of the presidential election to be overturned, after Trump has refused to concede and pushed unfounded claims of voter fraud ever since he lost to Joe Biden. 

At a pro-Trump rally at the Arizona State Capitol in February, he held aloft a banner reading ‘Q Sent Me’ in reference to QAnon.  

He was also seen at reopen Arizona rallies protesting against lockdowns put in place to slow the spread of COVID-19.   

In one photo posted on his Facebook account in November, where he calls himself Yellowstone Wolf, Angeli is seen shaking hands with Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney – who hours before the violence kicked off encouraged supporters to pursue a ‘trial by combat’.   

He has also posted about numerous conspiracy theories including a video claiming there is a ‘globalist plot for world domination thru the plandemic & its numerous different agendas’.   

Angeli has previously admitted his belief in QAnon started after reading conspiracy theories on the internet. 

‘At a certain point, it all clicked in a way,’ he said in an interview in February, reported AZCentral. 

‘Oh, my God. I see now the reality of what’s going on.’ 

QAnon is the debunked extreme right wing conspiracy theory that claims Satan-worshipping pedophiles are plotting against Trump and are running a global child sex trafficking ring.

An undated profile for Angeli on Backstage.com shows the 32-year-old was a singer, screenwriter and actor. 

Barnett has also bought into Trump’s unfounded claims that the election has been ‘stolen’ from him and has been spotted at other Stop The Steal rallies including one in Bentonville in November. 

In a November post on Facebook, where he goes by the alias George Reincarnated Patton, Barnett claimed he will run for governor of Arkansas in 2022 saying he will ‘be running on the COMMON SENSE platform’. 

He has also shared images of the Gadsden flag snake – which is regarded as a racist symbol – and boasts of being a white nationalist.

In several photos, he is seen posing with semi-automatic rifles. 

Johnson, who was pictured inside the Capitol making off with a lectern, appears to have removed his social media platforms in the aftermath of the siege.  

A female Trump supporter has now died after being shot inside the US Capitol when MAGA supporters stormed the building and violently clashed with police in a bid to stop Joe Biden’s victory being certified Wednesday.

The woman was shot in the chest on Wednesday afternoon after chaotic scenes broke out when dozens of Trump supporters breached security perimeters at the Capitol.

She died several hours later, law enforcement sources said. It was not immediately clear who shot the woman. Dozens of police were also reportedly injured in the violence and at lease one explosive device was found near the Capitol grounds. 

The National Guard was deployed to help police enforce a 6pm curfew in DC. Hundreds of protesters remained on the Capitol grounds after the curfew went into effect and Mayor Muriel Bowser refused to say if violators would be arrested.

Earlier in the evening, President-elect Joe Biden called for the ‘mob to pull back’ and said the uprising bordered on sedition.

Trump – after remaining silent for much of the afternoon – posted a video telling his ‘very special’ supporters inside the Capitol that he loves them and understands their pain but urged them ‘to go home’.

He had initially encouraged his supporters to march to the Capitol after a rally earlier in the afternoon before asking them only to remain peaceful when violence broke out.

The Capitol was briefly secured before being placed on lockdown again at around 6.45pm due to an ‘internal security threat’ after an officer was reportedly found unconscious. Anyone inside a building at the Capitol complex was instructed to take cover in an office with doors locked.

But just before 8pm lawmakers who had been whisked to safety when the siege kicked off began arriving back at the Capitol to resume the Joint Session to certify the Electoral College count of the presidential election.

The lawmakers were seen flanked by armed guards as they made their way into the Capitol. A spokesperson for Vice President Mike Pence, who is residing over the Joint Session, said he was already in the building because he’d never left.