Voting no on Jan. 6 commission is a mistake

A hundred years ago on Memorial Day weekend a race massacre in Tulsa, Okla., took the lives of hundreds of Black people. We don’t know the exact number, due to the event being largely omitted from much of history. Over 10,000 Black people were left homeless and the area known as Black Wall Street, one of the wealthiest Black neighborhoods in the United States, was destroyed. Despite increased discussion in recent years, many people have not heard of the Tulsa massacre.

Fast forward 100 years and on Memorial Day weekend our own U.S. Senate voted down a commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol raid. The amount of bloodshed that took place on Jan. 6 was nowhere near that of the violence that took place in Tulsa in the spring of 1921. However, in both cases, a powerful group was content in ignoring an incident that violated core American principles. Our own Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson and Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst from Iowa opposed the commission. Perhaps they missed the Sunday school lesson that covered John 8:32, “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” We cannot fix the events of Jan. 6 or how Congress votes, but we can vote for leaders who will seek out the truth. I encourage Iowans to do just that in 2022.

Brian Voss

Palo