RICHMOND, Virginia (LifeSiteNews) – The Virginia General Assembly gave final approval to legislation that would require all public schools in the state that discuss the January 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol to teach a highly editorialized presentation of the event as a historic “insurrection.” 

Five years ago, the riot broke out after President Donald Trump’s “March to Save America” rally, which was meant to encourage Congress to delay certification of the 2020 presidential election results over his contention that vote fraud in several states gave former President Joe Biden a victory that should have been his.

Viral videos showed people physically attacking police, pushing against security barricades, breaking through windows, trespassing in congressional offices, and climbing on walls, causing the vote certification to be suspended and lawmakers to be evacuated from the chambers. Other videos, however, also showed that many were let into the Capitol by police and simply walked the halls after the initial breach. Several people died, some after the rioting and only claimed to be related to it, but the only fatal victim of direct, intentional violence was unarmed Trump supporter Ashli Babbitt, shot by a Capitol police officer while she was climbing through an interior window.

Virginia House Bill 333 permits school boards to offer programs of instruction pertaining to January 6 but require any such programs to describe it “as an unprecedented, violent attack on United States democratic institutions, infrastructure, and representatives for the purpose of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election.” 

The bill also states that schools may not “describe, portray, or present as credible a description or portrayal of the actions precipitating or involved in the events of the January 6, 2021, insurrection as peaceful protest,” or any “statement or suggestion that there was extensive election fraud that could have changed or actually changed the results of the 2020 presidential election.”

HB 333 has cleared both chambers of the state legislature and now awaits signature by left-wing Democrat Gov. Abigail Spanberger.

While the January 6 riot was undoubtedly a violent event, denying anyone was there to peacefully protest is simply inaccurate. As stated above, many who “trespassed” into the Capitol were allowed to walk through open doors and merely walked and looked around. A total of 1,575 individuals were charged in connection with the riot, including an estimated 608 charges relating to “assaulting, resisting, or impeding law enforcement agents or officers or obstructing those officers during a civil disorder” and another 91 for destruction of government property. 

Those numbers, while serious, are a miniscule portion of overall rally attendance, estimates for which range anywhere from 10,000 to 80,000, establishing many thousands of attendees who did nothing more than peacefully protest.

Further, while some definitions of “insurrection” are as narrow as any act of rebellion or resistance to government authority (usually violently), the arguably more common understanding rests with definitions that specifically denote attempts to violently overthrow the government. It is the latter connotation left-wing activists wish to stir by labeling January 6 as an “insurrection,” despite not applying either definition of the term to acts committed by their supporters, such as the 2018 protests to attempt to interrupt future Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, or the 2011 occupation of the Wisconsin Capitol to protest then-Gov. Scott Walker’s reforms to public-sector union benefits and collective-bargaining rules.

As for the 2020 election, while no evidence was ever produced for a massive conspiracy that successfully “rigged” millions of votes, far more measured reasons for doubting the outcome were never debunked. 

Bolstered by the dramatic expansion of voting by mail in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, 28 states relaxed their mail ballot rules in 2020, contributing to a 17-million vote increase from 2016. In addition to mail ballots generally being less secure than in-person votes, four of those states – Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin – changed their rules without legislative consent. Those four alone comprised 56 of Biden’s electoral votes, more than enough to decide the victor.

At the same time, the Trump team’s attempts to prove the election had been stolen were undermined by judges who dismissed some claims on process issues without ever considering their merits, as well as flawed legal briefs by election challengers and dramatic examples of “smoking guns” that never panned out. Nevertheless, the controversy did lead to more than a dozen states tightening their election rules in the following years.

“While many on the left advocate censoring ‘disinformation,’ they are far less circumspect in promulgating their own disinformation,” George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley reacted. “Likewise, where Democrats have objected to the pressure put on universities for greater diversity of viewpoints as an attack on academic freedom, these Democrats see no problem in mandating the teaching of positions that are demonstrably false. Here, Rep. (Dan) Helmer and other Democrats are mandating the teaching of a false narrative to children rather than simply relying on public debate. The reason is that they are losing the debate over the characterization of this riot as an actual insurrection.”

Trump’s political opponents blamed him for “inciting” the riot, leading to an unsuccessful second impeachment attempt. Yet, despite the Biden FBI failing to find evidence that the violence was planned or organized, more than a dozen Democrat committee investigations into the event persisted, with hundreds of people arrested and many expressing concerns about their treatment and disproportionate, politically motivated punishment.

Upon Trump’s return to office after the 2024 election, one of his first acts was to grant blanket pardons to nearly all the January 6 defendants, contradicting previous assurances the pardons would be more narrowly tailored to exclude genuine violent offenders.