The final report from the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol added to bipartisan calls for changes to the Capitol Police that protects the building and members of Congress.

The select committee report, which mainly focused on former President Donald Trump’s monthslong effort to overturn his loss in the 2020 election, also detailed a series of decisions by police officials that left line officers without equipment and delayed the National Guard’s deployment in response to the attack on the joint session of Congress.

Members of the committee called for additional oversight of the police department “as it improves its planning, training, equipping, and intelligence processes and practices its critical incident response protocols, both internally and with law enforcement partners.” The committee suggested hearings with testimony from the Capitol Police Board.

And the report also recommended “full funding for critical security measures” and noted that the committee had “shared concerns about two specific areas of security” with the House Administration Committee.

The chair of that committee in the current Congress, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., also sat on the Jan. 6 panel. The House Administration Committee did not immediately respond Friday to a request for more information.

The recommendations in Thursday’s report followed more than two years of increased attention and funding for the Capitol Police in the wake of the attack.

Potential agreement

With Republicans set to take over the House next month, the push for increased oversight of the Capitol Police department may be one of the select committee’s few recommendations with bipartisan support.

Appropriators included $734.6 million for the agency in a fiscal 2023 omnibus funding bill that cleared the House on Friday afternoon — a more than 20 percent increase. That would allow the department to hire up to 2,126 officers and 567 civilians.

That’s separate from a roughly $1 billion security supplemental Congress passed last year in response to the attack that included $300 million for increased security measures, $71 million to cover police overtime and $35 million for mutual aid agreements with other law enforcement agencies.

The select committee report joined a series of calls from both chambers for changes to the United States Capitol Police after the attack. Last year, a joint, bipartisan report from the Senate Rules Committee and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee found numerous intelligence failures at the agency and called for changes to departmental structure that went beyond additional training.

On Wednesday, a group of five House Republicans, who were initially selected for the select committee but withdrawn by Rep. Kevin McCarthy, issued their own report that focused on security preparations in advance of the attack.