Former U.S. Capitol Police officer Shauni Kerkhoff filed a lawsuit against Blaze Media for a report it ran suggesting she planted the pipe bombs outside the Democratic and Republican National Committee headquarters ahead of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
The outlet ran a story titled “Former Capitol Police officer a forensic match for Jan. 6 pipe bomber, sources say,” falsely claiming that Kerkhoff’s gait closely matched surveillance video of the pipe bombing suspect. The story, now retracted, led to an FBI investigation of the former officer, who defended the grounds on Jan. 6, and prompted her current employer, the CIA, to place her on administrative leave, Kerkhoff said.
Kerkhoff filed the lawsuit on Tuesday, with her lawyers saying Blaze’s “false and defamatory accusations have irreparably changed her life.” The 127-page filing lists Blaze Media, reporters Stephen Baker and Joseph Hanneman, and a new media company, Veritas Regnat LLC, as defendants.
“Defendants’ reporting was false,” the lawsuit reads. “Ms. Kerkhoff was not the January 6 pipe bomber. She was a normal, private person—with a family, career, and hobbies—who was at home with her boyfriend and their dog at the exact time a hooded suspect was captured on CCTV placing pipe bombs in Washington, D.C.”
Kerkhoff, who has returned to her role as campus security at the CIA, is seeking monetary damages “in amounts to be proven at trial” against the defendants.
The Washington Examiner reached out to Blaze Media for comment.
In December 2025, the Department of Justice and the FBI announced federal authorities arrested Brian Cole Jr. of Woodbridge, Virginia, in connection with the Jan. 6 pipe bombs. Cole faces four federal counts in his indictment, including interstate transportation of explosives, malicious attempt to use explosives, and attempt to use a weapon of mass destruction.
“The FBI and DOJ ruled Ms. Kerkhoff out as a suspect,” Kerkhoff’s lawyers wrote in the lawsuit regarding how Cole’s charges ruled out Kerkhoff. “Even then-FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino—who had previously called the pipe bombing an ‘inside job’—called Defendants’ reporting ‘grossly inaccurate,’ adding that it ‘serves only to mislead the public.’”
In the filing, Kerkhoff’s lawyers noted that Baker himself stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, though he was pardoned by President Donald Trump.
FBI INVESTIGATED FORMER CAPITOL POLICE OFFICER IN JAN. 6 PIPE BOMB CASE, FILINGS SAY
While serving as a Capitol Police officer on Jan. 6, Kerkhoff fired nonlethal projectiles at rioters, then later testified against two rioters who were on trial, her lawyers said.
The lawsuit was filed in the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and assigned to Trump-appointed Judge Rossie David Alston Jr.