All the Media Folks Who Said Officer Sicknick Was Murdered During Capitol Hill Riot. Fact Check: He Was Not.

Matt Vespa | April 28, 2021 1:00 PM

This isn’t meant to say that Officer Brian Sicknick’s death is any less tragic. Sicknick was a Capitol Police officer who died during the Capitol Hill riots on January 6. Supposedly, he was murdered by the crew of Trump supporters that stormed the Capitol Building. We were told for weeks that his death was because of “Trump cop killers.” Well, that’s fake news. The medical examiner’s report is rather clear that Sicknick died of natural causes. The Washington Post interviewed the examiner who did the autopsy:

In an interview with The Washington Post, Francisco J. Diaz, the medical examiner, said the autopsy found no evidence the 42-year-old officer suffered an allergic reaction to chemical irritants, which Diaz said would have caused Sicknick’s throat to quickly seize. Diaz also said there was no evidence of internal or external injuries.
Sicknick collapsed after returning to his office during the riot and died about eight hours later, on Jan. 7.
Diaz said Sicknick suffered two strokes at the base of the brain stem caused by a clot in an artery that supplies blood to that area of the body. Diaz said he could not comment on whether Sicknick had a preexisting medical condition, citing privacy laws.

And here’s the clip of the media speculating how Sicknick was murdered before the facts were out:

SUPERCUT!

Media recklessly speculate Officer Sicknick murdered during Capitol riot pic.twitter.com/k7J72j47iF
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) April 28, 2021

Why is this member of Congress still falsely claiming that the mob "killed an officer" on January 6 when the DC Medical Examiner specifically rejected that theory after a comprehensive 3+ month evaluation https://t.co/BejJWdQZLK
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) April 28, 2021

"They killed a cop!" was repeated ad nauseum to drive home the narrative that everyone had to be extra fearful of the Jan 6 "insurrection" and accept all extreme retaliatory actions in its wake. Add that to the neverending stack of discredited falsehoods https://t.co/IGt9jt7k3v
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) April 19, 2021

This isn’t about correcting the record. This is about wiping away a smear. The media used Sicknick’s death to attack everyone who voted for Donald Trump in 2020. They rushed to weaponize this story to attack people they hate. Period. And they should get a shovel to the face for their bad behavior. They won’t—but a ton of people are eating crow over this. They’ll pivot, rationalize, or deflect but the fact is that the media was wrong yet again and used an officer’s death to attack their political enemies. And they wonder why we consider them enemies of the people. They are—all of them. You can still say that what happened on January 6 was outrageous and should have never happened. I don’t think you’ll have a hard time selling that argument. The question to the liberal media is why you wanted to politicize an officer’s death to make that point.