Biden insinuates unsubstantiated link between hammer attack on Paul Pelosi and Jan. 6 Capitol breach

President Joe Bden on Friday appeared to insinuate without substantiation that David DePape, the suspect charged in the violent assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband, Paul Pelosi, was motivated by the same anger that fueled the mob that flooded into the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

 

DePape broke into the Pelosi San Francisco home and wrested a hammer away from Paul Pelosi and struck him with it repeatedly, according to police, fracturing the 82-year-old investor's skull.

Pelosi was rushed into surgery Friday morning but is expected to recover.

 

The composite portrait of DePape emerging from Bay Area accounts depicts a tortured soul — a hemp jewelry maker and hard drug user who lived for a time in a Berkeley storage unit, former member of the Green Party, and best man at the wedding of San Francisco public nudity activist Gypsy Traub. In posts on a since-removed Facebook account and personal blog, DePape railed disjointedly against election fraud, COVID tyranny and globalist subversion, according to press accounts.

 

During the suspect's intrusion into the Pelosi home, he yelled, "Where's Nancy?" according to press accounts attributed to an unnamed law enforcement source.

 

The suspect's reported demand to know the House Speaker's whereabouts prompted President Biden to float an unsubstantiated link between Friday's home break-in/hammer assault to the unruly crowd breach of the Capitol almost two years ago to protest suspected electoral chicanery.

 

"It's reported that the same chant used by this guy they have in custody was used on January 6th in the attacks on the U.S. Capitol," Biden said Friday at a Democratic fundraiser in Philadelphia, the Washington TImes reported. "This is reported. I can't guarantee it. We can tell you what's being reported."

 

Amid a report that a third person inside the Pelosi home let police in and conflicting reports about whether DePape and Paul Pelosi were previously acquainted, an unfolding investigation by federal and local law enforcement has not yet determined a motive in the assault.