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The violence was instigated by informants that infiltrated the crowd. The crowd was peaceful chanting USA. The first act of violence happened when DC officer Thomas Lloyd ordered to shoot the crowd with plastic bullets, flash bangs, and tear gas, which incited the crowd.
That is true, in a sense.
However, it must be pointed out that the first violation of the law occurred when some members of the crowd pushed past the outer barricades. Now I can understand why some might seek to do this. Most were people who were at the very back of the crowd listening to Trumps speech back at the long lake. They left early (at the urging of several people in "Red Caps") in order to get the best spots at the next speech venue in front of the Capitol.
That act led to the idea that they could go further and try to get even closer. But they had stopped at the last barricades at the bottom of the Capitol steps. It was sometime during the period the crowd was milling around in the area beyond those final barricades that the order was given to fire rubber bullets and toss/fire various forms of gas and stun grenades into the crowd.
Several people in the crowd were injured and this led that crowd to push past the last barricade to assault the Capitol police. The police withdrew to inside the Capitol, but some of the crowd was still angry enough to attack the building exterior. The remaining vast majority were latecomers as well as others already there who were just watching and waiting to see what was happening.
The rest is history.