Adam Kinzinger shares a sad reality after Republicans find a new way to stick it to J6 police officers 

If there’s one thing Donald Trump and the MAGA warriors excel at, it’s pretending the bad stuff never happened. Or better yet, trying to rewrite Jan. 6 as some kind of patriotic Hallmark movie. Spoiler alert: It wasn’t. And Adam Kinzinger is out here reminding everyone that you can’t just delete the ugly parts of history.

The U.S. Mint has quietly removed from its website the replica Congressional Gold Medals that honored police officers who defended the Capitol on that day. You know, the ones who were physically assaulted and verbally abused by a mob of people convinced they were saving democracy. Those medals were a small but meaningful way to say, “Hey, we see your sacrifice.” But now? Poof. No explanation. No press release. Just quietly erased, like they hoped no one would notice.

Well, someone did notice. Former Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, who put his body on the line during the riot, discovered this the hard way when he tried to order some replica medals as gifts. Gonell took to X (formerly Twitter), writing:

Yo. I just tried to order some replicas of the gold medal for us. It has been removed from the U.S. mint website. Wtf.

— Staff Sergeant Gonell, Aquilino (@SergeantAqGo) February 27, 2025

Meanwhile, Kinzinger replied to Gonell’s post with his own zinger:

So basically, they are saying the coup should have succeeded but for those damn cops.

Got it https://t.co/bwbxOGmEx2

— Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱 (@AdamKinzinger) February 28, 2025

There it is — the sad, infuriating reality of the situation. The MAGA crowd, for all their chest-thumping about “backing the blue,” had no problem turning on law enforcement the moment those officers stood between them and their delusional attempt to overthrow a free and fair election. The same people who spent years screaming “Blue Lives Matter” were suddenly beating police officers with flagpoles and calling them traitors when the officers dared to do their jobs.

Officer Brian Sicknick died of a stroke shortly after the riot, and several others have died by suicide in the aftermath, their mental health shattered by the trauma of that day. One officer, Michael Fanone, described being pulled into the crowd, tased, and beaten as rioters chanted, “Kill him with his own gun.” Another, Daniel Hodges, was screaming in pain as he was crushed against a doorway by a mob that showed no mercy — here’s the photographic evidence.

And yet, we’re supposed to believe that removing replica medals from a website isn’t part of a broader effort to erase this chapter from history? Please. Trump might be many things, but subtle is not one of them. His attempts to rewrite Jan. 6 as a “beautiful day” full of “patriots” would be laughable if they weren’t so dangerous. Pardoning over 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants, including Proud Boys and Oath Keepers convicted of seditious conspiracy, is a blatant middle finger to the justice system. Let’s not forget the disappearance of nine videos entered as evidence against Glen Simon, one of the rioters. Coincidence? Sure.

Thankfully, we’ve got people like Adam Kinzinger who aren’t afraid to call out this nonsense. Whether he’s roasting Trump’s tariff policies, calling him a “weak boy” for his embarrassing pandering to Vladimir Putin, or dragging the GOP for appointing far-right podcaster Dan Bongino as deputy director of the FBI, Kinzinger has mastered the art of the political clapback.