Latino Sergeant Gonell reveals the horror of January 6, criticizes Trump’s return and Republican hypocrisy

Aquilino Gonell, a former police officer who was nearly crushed to death by the mob that stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, still carries shards of glass from the building’s tunnel entrance.

The Iraq War veteran displayed the shards in an interview on MSNBC’s “The ReidOut” on Thursday to remind the public of the day rioters stormed the Capitol, incited by then-President Donald Trump’s lie that the election had been stolen.

But he also hoped that they might be shown to Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, “because last week he hosted the man who sent the mob to tear down and smash the doors of the Capitol, where I almost died,” Gonell said.

Gonell, a Dominican, had to undergo physical and mental rehabilitation for his injuries. He said Johnson and other Republicans who welcomed Trump are alive today because of his and his colleagues’ actions on Jan. 6, “not because the guy they’re welcoming as heroes did nothing to keep them safe. He did nothing to protect them. For God’s sake, he’s the one who sent them to the Capitol, and here they are hugging him as if nothing happened.”

His injuries forced him to retire in December 2022.

Trump visited the Capitol for the first time on June 13 and was greeted with rapturous approval. Even some lawmakers who had condemned him after the deadly violence at the Capitol applauded him. The deaths and attacks on police officers were forgotten history at the Capitol gathering, where some lawmakers threw an early birthday party for Trump with cake.

Gonell said he and the officials he stays in touch with “felt sick” when they saw the senators last week “holding the hand of the same person who sent them running for their lives on January 6.”

“They are in an abusive relationship,” he said.

NBC News has asked Johnson’s office for a response.

Gonell, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in the Dominican Republic, testified in 2021 before the House committee investigating the violent attack on the Capitol. He described the confrontation at the time as a “protracted and desperate struggle.” He said he slipped in the middle and was then attacked and nearly crushed by the Trump supporters. As he found it increasingly difficult to breathe, he thought, “This is how I’m going to die,” he testified.

In his memoir, American Shield: The Immigrant Sergeant Who Defended Democracy, Gonell writes about how the attack on the Capitol tested him, and he compares the actions of January 6 to his loyalty to this country and his foundations as an immigrant.

He writes with admiration about the United States and how he rose from poverty to become the first in his family to graduate from college, serve his adopted country and rise to the rank of sergeant in the Capitol Police. But he also devotes the second part of his book to the attack on January 6, taking readers on a journey through the horrific moments and telling how the situation escalated when Trump expressed his support for the rioters on Twitter.

At the top of his feed on X (formerly Twitter), Gonell pinned photos documenting the attack on him.

In the MSNBC interview, he noted that he was deployed to Iraq in 2004 and, as he said, fought for democracy there.

“Here we are 20 years later in the United States and the party that sent me to Iraq is supporting someone who wants to be a dictator,” Gonell said. “That should be noticed and feared because nothing good will come of it.”