The officer even described coming face to face with police officers from across the country in the mob. He said some of them flashed their badges, telling him to let them through, and trying to explain that this was all part of a movement that was supposed to help.

"You have the nerve to be holding a blue lives matter flag, and you are out there fucking us up," he told one group of protestors he encountered inside the Capitol. "[One guy] pulled out his badge and he said, `we're doing this for you.' Another guy had his badge. So I was like, `well, you gotta be kidding.'"

Another officer, a newer recruit, echoed these sentiments, saying that where he was on the steps to the rotunda on the east side of the Capitol, he was engaged in hand-to-hand battles trying to fight the attackers off. But he said they were outnumbered 10 to one, and described extraordinary scenes in which protesters holding Blue Lives Matter flags launched themselves at police officers.