A ceremonial session of Congress to formally declare President-elect Joe Biden’s victory devolved in an instant into a scene of violence and mayhem in the Capitol on Wednesday when a pro-Trump mob stormed the building, halting the counting of electoral votes.
Journalists from The New York Times witnessed the scene. Here is how the chaos unfolded:
Not long after Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate majority leader, warned his Republican colleagues that their efforts to overturn a U.S. election would send its democracy into a "death spiral,” fear surged through the Senate chamber.