The same polarizing politics that led to the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol may also prevent Congress from investigating the attack.
Ahead of the House's vote Wednesday to create an investigative commission, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California voiced his opposition to the bill. But several of his fellow Republicans have broken from the leadership's stance, signaling they would support an independent probe into the unprecedented attempt to subvert American democracy.
The GOP's splintering over the Jan. 6 commission underscores divisions within the party, between those who remain loyal to Donald Trump and those who want the GOP to go in a different direction. And lack of significant support from Republicans on such a critical issue will only perpetuate the dysfunctions within the country's political system.
Co-sponsored by Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi and GOP Rep. John Katko of New York, the commission would consist of 10 members, evenly appointed by the two parties' leadership in the House and Senate. Modeled after the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, this body would have the power to receive evidence and issue subpoenas.
The commission would be required to hold public hearings and submit a final report to Congress and President Biden by the end of the year.
Even after Democrats conceded to McCarthy on a number of points aimed at making the commission more bipartisan and independent, the minority leader formally announced his opposition Tuesday. McCarthy said the scope of the investigation should be broadened to include violent incidents that occurred across the country as a result of racial justice protests.
"Given the political misdirections that have marred this process, given the now duplicative and potentially counterproductive nature of this effort, and given the Speaker's shortsighted scope that does not examine interrelated forms of political violence in America, I cannot support this legislation," McCarthy said in a statement.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi originally proposed Biden would have a say in the committee appointments, but that was rolled back during negotiations. Party leaders also agreed that the Democrat-appointed chair and the Republican-appointed vice chair would need to agree on which witnesses to subpoena. They also agreed to ban current elected officials from serving on the commission in an effort to make the investigation more independent.
While the Jan. 6 commission bill doesn't need Republican votes to pass in the Democrat-majority House, receiving GOP support in that chamber could make it easier for the legislation to obtain the 60 votes needed to pass in the evenly split Senate.
However, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell piled onto the GOP opposition Wednesday by announcing he would vote against creating a Jan. 6 commission — a blow to the bill's chances in the Senate.
Failing to receive support from both major parties would be a noteworthy departure from historical precedent. In the cases of Watergate and 9/11, Congress overwhelmingly supported establishing investigative committees.
During a press call Wednesday, former New Jersey Gov. Tom Kean and former Rep. Lee Hamilton, who served as chairman and vice chairman of the 9/11 commission, urged Congress to approve the commission and investigate the Jan. 6 attack. They said "unity of purpose" was key to their commission's effectiveness.
"We put country above party to examine, without bias, the events before, during, and after the attacks," Kean and Hamilton said. "The January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol was one of the darkest days in our history. Americans deserve an objective and accurate account of what happened. As we did in the wake of September 11, it is time to set aside partisan politics and come together as Americans in common pursuit of truth and justice."
image of U.S. President Donald Trump is displayed on a digital billboard in Times Square in New York on April 8, 2026.
Trump is stuck between two realities. Neither serves the American people
Normally, I worry that events may overtake a column. But not so with the Iran war.
I don’t worry about running afoul of a headline or Truth Social post from the president because what is said about the situation is no longer very relevant to the reality.
On April 8, Nick Catoggio, my Dispatch colleague, dubbed an earlier stoppage with Iran “Schrödinger’s ceasefire.” This was a reference to the famous thought experiment by the physicist Erwin Schrödinger, who was trying to explain the weirdness of “superpositionality” in quantum physics. A cat in a box is both dead and alive at the same time until you open the box. Schrödinger meant to illustrate the absurdity of the idea that particles aren’t any one thing, but a “cloud of probabilities.”
The Trump administration is stuck in a word cloud of probabilities of his own making. The war is over. The war is on. The war isn’t a war. We have a deal, but we don’t have a deal, but we’re about to have a deal. We destroyed Iran’s military. No, we left it intact. We want regime change. No we don’t. We already accomplished it. We “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program a year ago. We had to go to war in February to prevent nuclear war. The Strait of Hormuz is open, closed, or something in-between. No deal without “unconditional surrender.” Let’s make a deal!
This everything-all-at-once vibe can be disorienting, particularly since most Americans didn’t have a war with Iran on their bingo cards until the shooting had already started. President Trump didn’t prepare the country or consult with Congress beforehand because he thought it would all be a smashing success in a matter of weeks.
The miscalculation that started it all: killing Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and much of Iran’s senior leadership, on the first day of the war. To “the great proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand,” Trump announced on Feb. 28. “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.”
I support regime change in Iran and shed no tears for Khamenei or his goons. But when you start a war by killing the regime’s top leaders, it’s not unreasonable for the remaining ones to conclude that you really intend regime change.
Khamenei was a murderous fanatic, but he was a fairly cautious one. He liked to threaten closing the Strait of Hormuz or attacking our regional allies, but he was reluctant to actually do it, fearing it would invite a regime change war. The mullahs and IRGC goons believed, not unreasonably, that if they lost their grip on power, they’d be lynched by the Iranian people they’ve brutalized for decades.
By starting with a regime change war, Trump removed any reason for the regime not to go for broke. When you have nothing to lose — particularly when you are a millenarian religious fanatic — a Persian Alamo strategy makes a lot of sense.
So Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz and attacked its neighbors.
But it turns out this wasn’t the Alamo. In the contest of wills, Trump blinked. The Iranian regime’s tolerance for punishment proved — so far — to be greater than Trump’s and that of our gulf allies. Militarily we could finish the job, but that would require ground troops and much greater economic turmoil. In a conflict Trump launched unilaterally without the prior support of Congress, NATO or the American people, Trump doesn’t have the political capital for that.
But that’s only half the problem. Trump wants the war over, but he doesn’t want to pay — militarily, economically, politically — what that would cost. So he wants to make a deal that ends it. But there is no deal available that wouldn’t come at an equally undesirable cost. Any deal that looks like what President Obama struck with the Iranians would be too embarrassing to bear. But the Iranians are convinced that they can get just such a deal, and they’re willing to drag things out as long as it takes.
The result: Trump’s in a box of his own making. He thinks he can talk his way out by simply asserting a reality that doesn’t exist. When the financial markets get nervous, he announces a breakthrough that is, at best, a possibility. When the Iranians agree to a deal that looks similar to one Obama might negotiate, Trump goes back to his threats.
It can’t go on forever. But I’m sure it’ll last until long after this column is forgotten.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.