Byrd said he has endured threats, including “racist attacks,” since shooting Babbitt during the Capitol riot.
Lt. Michael Byrd, the officer who fatally shot Ashli Babbitt during the Jan.6 invasion of the U.S. Capitol, said in his first comments after publicly revealing his identity that the unarmed rioter was “posing a threat” to Congress. “I had been yelling and screaming as loud as I was, ‘Please stop, get back, get back,'” Byrd told NBC Nightly News’ Lester Holt in an interview that aired Thursday evening. “You’re ultimately hoping your commands will be complied with, and unfortunately they were not,” he said. The officer’s remarks came three days after the U.S. Capitol Police Department said that it would not discipline him following an internal investigation of the Jan.6 shooting. The Department of Justice in April said it would not pursue criminal charges against the officer. Neither of those agencies identified the officer as they shared their findings. The USCP in a press release Monday noted, “This officer and the officer’s family have been the subject of numerous credible and specific threats.” Byrd shot Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran, in the Capitol on Jan.6 as she attempted to climb through an opening in a barricaded door where a glass panel had broken out, the Justice Department’s investigation found.
