Video shows heightened security ahead of Biden inauguration ceremony | Fact check

Chris Mueller, USA TODAY
·2 min read
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The claim: Video shows military presence near Capitol Hill in January 2024

A Jan. 27 Facebook video (direct link, archive link) shows armed soldiers standing in the street near the Capitol building in Washington D.C.

"AMERICAN CIVIL WAR – The US Army is deployed around the White House," reads the video's caption. "Protecting the American President from...the Americans. Do they know that civil war is coming? Are they deliberately fueling a civil war in order to enact strict laws?"

Text in the video reads, "They know its (sic) coming."

Similar posts were shared on Facebook and X, formerly Twitter.

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Our rating: False

The video is miscaptioned. It shows Capitol Hill in January 2021 amid heightened security for President Joe Biden's inauguration.

Video shows security for Biden's inauguration

The footage is not recent. It has been online since at least Jan. 19, 2021, the day before Biden's inauguration ceremony.

More than 20,000 members of the National Guard were deployed to Washington for added security ahead of the inauguration, which happened two weeks after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. The soldiers were present in the capital for days before the ceremony.

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A video posted on YouTube by MSNBC on Jan. 14, 2021, shows soldiers standing near concrete barriers in the same location as the Facebook video.

While there were scattered arrests and a few protesters, Biden's inauguration went on without significant disruption or violence, as USA TODAY previously reported.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

Reuters also debunked the claim.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Video shows security before Biden inauguration ceremony | Fact check