President Joe Biden made an unannounced visit to the U.S. Capitol Rotunda Tuesday night at 10 PM, to pay his respects to U.S. Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, murdered in the line of duty during Donald Trump’s January 6 attempted coup.
Biden’s schedule did not mention he would be traveling to the Capitol, and he did not allow the White House press pool to enter the Rotunda. The pool was also not told where the President, who is traveling with the First Lady, was going.
Officer Sicknick is lying in honor beginning Tuesday night, before being interred at Arlington National Cemetery. Tonight was reserved for Sicknick’s family, along with members of the Capitol Police and National Guard, in which he served.
President Biden spent decades working in the U.S. Capitol, as MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell noted, and he would have known Officer Sicknick personally.
House Democratic and Republican leaders are also in attendance:
MSNBC and CNN aired the ceremony in full. Fox News did not air any part of it, as far as NCRM could discern. CNN’s senior media reporter confirms: