Exclusive: Officer who killed Ashli Babbitt abandoned US Capitol post for card game, lied to investigators about it, source says
The U.S. Capitol Police lieutenant who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt at the Capitol on Jan. 6 was recommended for termination in 2001 for abandoning his post in the Speaker’s Office for a card game in a nearby cloakroom, then lying about it to Internal Affairs Division investigators, Blaze News has learned.
The 2001 investigation of Michael L. Byrd, 56, was the first known disciplinary case brought against the lieutenant who crept from his blind near the doors to the Speaker’s Lobby on Jan. 6, 2021, and shot Babbitt to death. The 2001 incident is the fourth such disciplinary case disclosed since Nov. 20.
A source with detailed knowledge of the Internal Affairs Division case told Blaze News that Byrd was charged with abandoning his post, eating and drinking at his post, and lying to investigators — a terminable offense. It is one of three Byrd disciplinary cases for which records could not be found when a House oversight subcommittee requested them in early 2024, the source said.
Byrd was assigned to the Speaker’s Office of U.S. Rep. Denny Hastert (R-Ill.) on the evening in question. During his break, Byrd went to play cards in a cloak room near the House Chamber, the source said.
'He ends up getting into some trouble, but they won't terminate him.'
Byrd went to relieve the officer who covered Hastert’s office during Byrd’s break, but then abandoned his post and returned to the cloakroom to play cards, the source told Blaze News.
“Well, the sergeant walks by and was like, ‘Man, there’s nobody in the Speaker’s Office,’” said the source, who has worked in the top levels of U.S. Capitol Police administration. “This is a big issue.”
An internal investigation was opened.
“Of course, we have cameras everywhere and we track him walking off post, going back to the cloakroom,” the source said. “And we talked to the other people in there and he was in there playing cards.”
Investigators also found that Byrd was eating and drinking at his post in the Speaker’s Office, activities forbidden by department policy, the source said.
“Supposed to be a bit of the decorum there, but he’s sitting in a chair eating and drinking a soda, which is a big taboo, especially back then,” the source said. “It’s the Speaker’s Office.”
Investigators confronted Byrd with their findings. He denied it all.
“Mike denies that he was supposed to be assigned to the post,” the source told Blaze News. “So therefore he couldn’t abandon the post. He denied eating and denied drinking on the post.”
Investigators already had the evidence they needed, but they gave Byrd a chance to come clean, the source said.
“They told him — and this is what we do when we’re getting ready to charge somebody — ‘We know different, Mike. There are video cameras up there.’ Mike still denies it.”
The USCP disciplinary officer recommended that Byrd be fired.
“So they charge him with eating, drinking on post, abandoning post,” the source said. “They charge him with untruthful statements with the recommendation to terminate.”
Even with the evidence and firing recommendation, Capitol Police administration did not part ways with Byrd.
“He ends up getting into some trouble, but they won’t terminate him,” the source said. “So therefore they didn’t want to move forward with the untruthful statements [charge], but that was still a sustained charge against him.”
The source questioned how records of the 2001 case and two other disciplinary cases brought against Byrd could be “missing,” as congressional investigators were told by the USCP in early 2024. There are too many intersecting emails and memos outside Byrd’s internal-affairs jacket for the record to be fully missing, the source said.
“That would’ve been documented so many different ways that it’d be impossible for them not to have it,” the source said.
“It’s funny to me that everyone knows Mike’s a liar and the case that sustains it that had all the evidence that shows he is a liar is something that Tad [DiBiase] and the department can’t find when there’s all these different records. If they just did a search on the emails, all this stuff, it would be in existence.”
Thomas A. “Tad” DiBiase is general counsel for U.S. Capitol Police.
Blaze News reached out to the Capitol Police and an attorney for Byrd but did not receive a reply by press time.
Concerns about promotion
As more details of Byrd’s work history emerge, a key Republican lawmaker expressed reservations about Byrd’s 2023 promotion to captain.
“I have concerns about this decision, given Byrd’s lengthy disciplinary history and the apparent political influence of internal operational decisions related to Byrd following January 6, 2021,” U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) wrote in a Nov. 20 letter to Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger.
Revelation of Byrd’s 2001 disciplinary case comes as congressional investigators disclosed the lengths Democrat lawmakers and Capitol Police went to after Jan. 6 to provide Byrd with income, security upgrades at his Maryland home, and months of free lodging at a secure military hotel at Joint Base Andrews in Prince George’s County, Md.
Records obtained by the Committee on House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight showed top House Democrats worked with DiBiase to find ways to help Byrd financially in the months after he shot and killed Babbitt at the Capitol. The records were first disclosed by journalist John Solomon and Just the News.
Byrd was given $36,000 in unrestricted funds as a “retention bonus” in 2021, while other Capitol Police officers received around $3,000 each. Byrd was reimbursed for more than $21,000 in security upgrades for his personal residence in Prince George’s County.
Capitol Police paid to house Byrd at the Joint Base Andrews military facility from July 2021 until late January 2022 at a cost of more than $35,000, according to records obtained by Judicial Watch Inc. When he left the base for any reason, Byrd was provided with a Capitol Police dignitary protection detail, which a source told Blaze News could easily cost $425 per hour.
'This is really bad for you all to do this when you know we’re expecting to have funds soon.'
DiBiase met with Jamie Fleet, staff director for then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), to discuss options to help Byrd, according to an email uncovered by congressional investigators. Pelosi had earlier said that she wanted Byrd “taken care of,” said a Blaze News source who directly witnessed the statement during a meeting.
DiBiase suggested that they could place Byrd at one of the department’s “continuity sites,” but that would require a top-secret clearance. Continuity sites are maintained to ensure that Capitol Police could continue to operate and communicate in the event of a catastrophe in Washington, D.C.
“We believe it would be very difficult for him to obtain one, give that he has had significant financial issues in the past and is currently on the USCP Lewis List,” DiBiase wrote.
The Lewis List is a confidential database of police officers who have disciplinary records and could face added scrutiny if they were called as witnesses in criminal cases.
Capitol Police considered assigning Byrd as head of security at the USCP Alternate Communications Facility, which is located outside the capital region. Under such a plan, Byrd could be awarded a per-diem payment for expenses. Sources told Blaze News that other Capitol Police officers assigned to the ACF have not been given per-diem payments.
Avoid fitness-for-duty test
DiBiase wrote that the USCP could help Byrd obtain mental health assistance, “but not move forward on a FFDE [fitness for duty evaluation] since a negative one could mean we should not allow him to carry our USCP-issued firearm if he is not fit to be a police officer.
“We believe it is more important for him to have his weapon and the ability to defend himself,” DiBiase wrote. “We have no indication Mike intends to harm himself and he has access to personal weapons, so even if we were to remove his weapon, there would still be some danger.”
According to Loudermilk’s Nov. 20 letter, the Capitol Police had planned to loan a shotgun to Byrd, but he failed the federal background check and did not qualify after shotgun training.
There was an early plan to provide Byrd with a payment from the Capitol Police Officers Memorial Fund, which was founded to honor fallen officers and support their survivors. Byrd expressed frustration that the fund was being opened to officers who were injured on Jan. 6.
“What you proposed could take months,” Byrd wrote in an email to DiBiase at 8:47 p.m. Nov. 16, 2021. “Our expectation was that this would be done soon. Now you’re telling me we got to wait for the rest of the department to even file claims, get evaluated and go through the process we have endured for months.
“That is blatantly wrong to treat us like this,” Byrd wrote. “This was never proposed to us in this manner. Now we’re being grouped in with everyone else. Wow! This is really bad for you all to do this when you know we’re expecting to have funds soon. So disappointing!”
In a reply email one minute later, DiBiase was taken aback by Byrd’s attitude.
“I’m sorry you are disappointed,” DiBiase wrote. “I find that surprising since we have already provided you $36,000 in unrestricted retention funds. You know what the rest of the department is receiving? $3,000 each. Yes, you are being lumped in with the other 91 officers who suffered injuries that day. The Memorial Fund is for the entire department, not one officer.”
Byrd shot back 20 minutes later, “We play the game as you request and then once we’re in compliance you guys change the rules on us. If we were aware that our situation would be looped in with everyone on the department then we would have been better prepared.
“We were expecting this was for us and everyone else has their own situation,” Byrd wrote.
As a postscript, Byrd added: “Just so you know, my wife is vividly upset and in tears because of this news. We have to wait additionally for the fund and can’t get approval to start the GoFundMe. Happy Holidays!”
Byrd’s weapon was pointed directly at the back of U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas).
Word of the proposal to give Byrd a potentially hefty payment from the memorial fund spread around the department, and officers were not happy, said Gus Papathanasiou, chairman of the United States Capitol Police Labor Committee.
Papathanasiou said he expressed his opposition to the idea directly to acting Chief Yogananda Pittman. Rumors swirled around the department that Pittman wanted to give Byrd $400,000 from the memorial fund, he said.
“I brought it up in a formal meeting, and I had a couple of my board members with me,” Papathanasiou told Blaze News. “She looked at me like I had 10 heads. She wouldn’t agree or deny it that it happened or it was going to happen.
“Once we got wind of it and brought it to their attention, all of a sudden it kind of took them aback. They didn't expect it,” Papathanasiou said.
A GoFundMe account set up in November 2021 to benefit Byrd ended up raising $164,206 from 3,621 donors. One of the largest donations came from U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), who chipped in $2,500. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), a member of the Jan. 6 Select Committee, donated $200.
“A worthy cause, as this man has faced quite an onslaught of misinformation and extreme threats,” Kinzinger posted on Twitter Nov. 18, 2021.
Byrd was notified by DiBiase on July 15, 2022, that he would not receive any payments from the Officers Memorial Fund. In an email reply a few hours later, Byrd said: “I will address on my own. USCP will not look good as a result.”
The department also looked at whether it could provide funding to Byrd to cover closing costs on the sale/purchase of a new home, according to the July 2021 DiBiase email.
Earlier discipline cases revealed
In November 2024, Loudermilk’s subcommittee disclosed several other disciplinary cases brought against Byrd since 2004.
Those included charges that he fired a weapon at fleeing vehicles near his home and provided an “inaccurate” account to investigators, claiming the vehicles were coming at him and attempting to run him over.
The Capitol Police Internal Affairs Division determined that Byrd violated use of force and use of weapons policies by discharging his service weapon in a “careless and imprudent manner.” Byrd appealed the finding to the Disciplinary Review Board, which overruled the OPR findings.
Questions have been raised about Byrd’s handling of his service weapon on Jan. 6, besides the fatal shooting. A news photo distributed by Getty Images shows Capitol Police plainclothes agents with their guns pointed at the main House door after rioters in the hallway outside broke out some of the door’s frosted panes of glass. The agents had their fingers straight along the barrels, above the triggers of their weapons.
Byrd walked down the row of seats nearest the door with his finger on the trigger of his Glock handgun, the photo showed. He carried the Glock in his right hand at hip level and a package or similar object in his left hand.
Law enforcement officers are trained to keep their fingers off the trigger until they intend to fire and not point a weapon at any target they don’t intend to shoot.
Byrd’s weapon was pointed directly at the back of U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas), who was defending the House entrance with a long wooden hand sanitizer stand. Four other plainclothes and uniformed police officers were in his vicinity at the time.
In 2015, Byrd was suspended without pay for seven days for an incident at a high school football game where Byrd berated an officer from the Montgomery County Police Department working security at the game, accusing him of being a “piece of sh*t” and a “racist a**hole.”
Byrd was suspended for 33 days without pay in 2019 for leaving his loaded service weapon in a bathroom in the Capitol Visitor Center. The gun was left unattended in the bathroom for some 55 minutes before it was discovered by another officer.
Byrd also has a long history of financial troubles, according to Maryland public records and federal court filings.
In August 2019, the federal government won a tax-lien judgment of $56,366 against Byrd in Prince George’s Circuit Court.
According to federal court records, Byrd filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy on March 9, 2009, and the case was converted to Chapter 7 bankruptcy in July 2010. Creditors filed $1.27 million in claims against Byrd. The case was discharged for $14,563.
Byrd also filed for bankruptcy in April 1999, and the case was discharged in July 1999. Archived U.S. Bankruptcy Court records do not indicate the amount of debt discharged in the case.
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