US Senate reconvenes to certify Biden win after protesters invaded Capitol

WASHINGTON: The United States Senate resumed the process of certifying Joe Biden's presidential election victory on Wednesday (Jan 6), more than six hours after supporters of President Donald Trump attacked the Capitol and forced lawmakers to flee.

"As we reconvene in this chamber, the world will again witness the resilience and strength of our democracy," Vice President Mike Pence said as he brought the Senate into session.

"To those who wreaked havoc in our Capitol today, you did not win. Violence never wins, freedom wins," Pence added. "Let's get back to work," he said, drawing applause.

"We will certify the winner of the 2020 election," Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell added, calling the assault by Trump supporters a "failed insurrection".

READ: 'It's insurrection,' says Biden, as Trump supporters storm US Capitol

READ: Donald Trump tells supporters to 'go home' after storming of US Capitol

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said Trump “bears a great deal of the blame” for a day that will “live forever in infamy”, describing the events as a stain on the country.

Schumer said the events “did not happen spontaneously”.

He said: “The president, who promoted conspiracy theories that motivated these thugs, the president, who exhorted them to come to our nation’s capital, egged them on.”

Schumer says the protesters should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Police declared the Capitol building secure shortly after 5.30pm (6.30am Singapore time), and lawmakers reconvened shortly after 8pm to resume the election certification.

Scores of Republican representatives and 13 GOP senators had planned to object on Wednesday to the electoral votes of perhaps six states that backed Biden. In light of the day’s violent events, however, multiple Republican senators reversed course and said they would not object to congressional certification of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory.

Senators Steve Daines of Montana, Mike Braun of Indiana and Kelly Loeffler of Georgia all said they would stand down from planned objections to Biden’s win.

Loeffler said that the “violence, the lawlessness and siege of the halls of Congress” were a “direct attack” on the “sanctity of the American democratic process”.

All three had previously signed on to Trump's false claims of widespread voter fraud to explain his defeat. Loeffler has just days left in her term. She lost her Senate race to Democrat Raphael Warnock earlier on Wednesday.

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Earlier, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that lawmakers would resume the count of electoral votes to confirm the November election result once the US Capitol was cleared.

Pelosi said she made the decision in consultation with the Pentagon, the Justice Department and the vice president, who will preside.

"We have decided we should proceed tonight at the Capitol once it is cleared for use," Pelosi said in a letter to colleagues, after reports that the building was secured by police and demonstrators were removed.

The senior lawmaker blasted the storming of the Capitol as a "shameful assault" on American democracy that was "anointed at the highest level of government, but said "it cannot, however, deter us from our responsibility to validate the election of Joe Biden".

She noted the day would always be “part of history", but now it would be “as such a shameful picture of our country was put out into the world".

READ: Twitter locks Trump's account, threatens permanent ban over violations

READ: World stunned by violence in US Capitol as protesters attempt to overturn election

Trump had encouraged his supporters to come to Washington to fight Congress’ formal approval of President-elect Joe Biden’s win.

He held a rally earlier on Wednesday and urged his supporters to march to the Capitol, telling them to “get rid of the weak Congress people” and saying, “get the weak ones get out; this is the time for strength”.

Trump supporters breached the Capitol building and clashed with law enforcement before disrupting Congress’ tallying of the Electoral College votes. Trump issued a restrained call for peace but did not call on his supporters to leave.

Trump has repeatedly told his supporters that the November election was stolen from him, even though that is not true.