This is pure gaslighting: “60 Minutes” own video shows Epps encouraging an attack on the Capitol. Yet federal law enforcement officials have given him a free pass.

Bill Whitaker: For millions of consumers of conservative news… Ray Epps is a notorious villain … a provocateur responsible for turning peaceful protests on January 6th into a violent assault on the U.S. Capitol. The irony is that Epps was a passionate supporter of President Trump who went to Washington to protest the 2020 election.

But his often contradictory behavior that day spawned a full-fledged conspiracy theory, casting him as a government agent who incited an insurrection. Today, Epps is in hiding, after death threats forced him to sell his home. So who is Ray Epps?

Tonight, you'll hear from the government, and the man himself. <Read More>

Ray Epps: As soon as President Trump is finished speaking, we are going to the Capitol. It's that direction. 

Bill Whitaker: At 6-foot-4, in his desert camouflage, bright red Trump hat, and military-style backpack, Ray Epps stood out from the crowd on January 6th. That's him running toward the U.S. Capitol alongside the vanguard of rioters who first attacked and overran police.  <Watch the Segment or read the transcript.>

The interview ends…

Bill Whitaker: If you're wondering what the FBI has to say about all this - for the past two years it has said nothing. After repeated queries by 60 Minutes, late this past week the Bureau issued this statement – quote – "Ray Epps has never been an FBI source or an FBI employee."

The sad truth is that the FBI is corrupt, partisan, and untrustworthy – proven guilty of altering documents, lying to the Court under oath, and fabricating false narratives. Their word is worthless.

In the follow-up segment, 60 Minutes Overtime, the headline reads, “Jan. 6 committee staffer: ‘Zero evidence that Ray Epps was a federal agent.’”

Bill Whitaker: Tom Joscelyn is a researcher and author, one of the country's top terrorism experts …  tapped by the January 6th Committee to help write its final report, which found evidence far-right extremists like the Proud Boys planned and executed the breach of the Capitol. He says the committee interviewed Epps – and found he wasn't important enough to put in the report.

Tom Joscelyn: I wouldn't defend Ray Epps or anybody else on Capitol grounds that day. I would just defend the facts. So the idea that he's leading the charge or really orchestrating it is just contradicted by this mountain range of evidence. And that's what the conspiracy theorists want you to, want you to do, right? They don't want you to look at this mountain range of evidence. They want you to turn around and focus on this pebble on the ground named Ray Epps. They also don't want you to look at what President Trump was saying and doing.

Unfortunately, we have seen the illegally constituted House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol was deeply corrupt, partisan, and had no problem manipulating sworn testimony or documentary evidence as they ignored their duty in a frantic effort to find Donald Trump culpable of a prosecutable crime that would stop a 2024 campaign run for the presidency.

Is Ray Epps part of a January 6 delusional conspiracy theory, as the progressive communist democrats allege, or is there something more?

What we think we know:

1. Ray Epps was on the scene the day before and the day of the January 6 protest, as evidenced by video recordings.

2. Ray Epps appears to be captured performing activities that have never been fully explained in an adversarial proceeding.

3. Ray Epps briefly appeared on an FBI wanted poster and was promptly removed.

4. Ray Epps was never arrested, jailed, or treated like other January 6 protesters, some of whom were imprisoned in horrible conditions awaiting trial. A clear violation of their civil rights while government prosecutors denied access to exculpatory evidence.

5. The legacy media continues to falsely paint the “mostly peaceful” January 6 activities as an insurrection, which is prima facie ludicrous.

6. Several people who self-identified as Trump supporters were “camouflaged” opposition activists and agitators. Some being undercover government officers and intelligence operatives or informers.

7. The legacy media continues to protect the narrative surrounding January 6, including the shocking death of Ashley Babbitt, who a Capitol Police Officer unnecessarily shot, and Rosanne Boyland, who died under unknown circumstances involving police officers.

8. There has been no comprehensive investigation of House, Senate, Capitol Police, and D.C. Metropolitan Police Department leadership whose bad judgment, or worse, was a precipitating factor.

9. The government cannot be trusted to reveal the truth and has resisted efforts for full public disclosure, sometimes under the flimsiest of excuses for withholding information.

So why do we see the legacy media’s defense of Ray Epps?

What is the purpose of this relatively worthless distraction?

What is about to happen or be revealed?

Is it a mistake?

Except under the progressive communist democrats, Americans are considered innocent until proven guilty. Ray Epps has never been found guilty of anything. Did a misinterpretation of his own words do in Ray Epps?

Bill Whitaker: Epps says he left the Capitol grounds to help evacuate an injured man. The time: 2:54 p.m.

Ray Epps: I looked back at the Capitol, and there was people crawlin' up the Capitol walls. And it looked like, it looked terrible. I mean, I was kind of ashamed of what, what was goin' on at that point. So I started to walk out.

Bill Whitaker: He told us that's when he sent this text to his nephew. Conspiracists saw it as the true confession of an agent provocateur.

Bill Whitaker: "I was in front with a few others. I also orchestrated it."  Explain this to me.

Ray Epps: I was boasting to my nephew. I helped get people there. I was directing people to the Capitol that morning.

Bill Whitaker: You know how this sounds?

Ray Epps: I know exactly how it sounds. I've been scolded by my wife for using that word. I shouldn't have used that word.

Bill Whitaker: When you add up all of these things, as your critics have done, you've given them a lot of ammunition to paint you as this instigator.

Ray Epps: There was an effort to make me a scapegoat.

Bottom line…

The key take-aways: one, hundreds of protesters were hunted down and prosecuted while Epps went free despite video evidence of involvement in inciting the crowd; and two, the FBI responded to 60 Minutes but refused to answer to Congress when under oath. 

We are so screwed when we can’t trust our government and its media propagandists to tell the news, not the narrative.

-- Steve