Bucks Jan. 6 rioter ousted from elected post after conviction and saying she’d shoot Pelosi in the ‘friggin’ brain’

Bucks County Republicans voted this month to oust an elected committee person two months after she was sentenced to incarceration for participating in the Capitol riot.

Dawn Bancroft, a 60-year-old former CrossFit gym owner, narrowly won her seat against an opponent in the May primary after she admitted to a federal judge in Washington that she had filmed a video during the insurrection in which she said she’d been looking for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi so she could “shoot her in the friggin’ brain.”

She pleaded guilty last year to one misdemeanor count of illegally demonstrating on Capitol grounds and was sentenced in July to 60 days.

Patricia Poprik, chair of the Bucks County Republican Committee, said Thursday that the party had to wait until after Bancroft’s sentencing to initiate removal proceedings under the party’s bylaws.

“People feel that if you’re convicted and you’re in jail, you can’t be a committee person,” Poprik said.

Still, the vote taken by 100 members of the GOP executive committee last week was not unanimous — and included four or five dissenters, Poprik said. It did not bar Bancroft from running again for the post after she has served her time.

At her July sentencing hearing, Bancroft — the former owner of Bucks County Elite Fitness in Doylestown — described her actions on Jan. 6, 2021, as “inappropriate, childish, and foolish” and maintained she wasn’t serious when she made the threat against Pelosi in a selfie video she sent to a friend.

Since her arrest last year, she said, she’s been threatened, harassed, lost her gym’s CrossFit affiliation, and was ultimately forced to sell her business after more than half of her clients left.

Bancroft had traveled to Washington that day with Diana Santos-Smith, a housekeeper and former hospice care worker from Upper Black Eddy whom she’d met through her gym.

Surveillance video showed the women entering the Capitol twice through already-shattered windows. Bancroft — wearing a red MAGA beanie with a flag emblazoned with the words “All Aboard the Trump Train” over her shoulders — appeared to shoot a video on her cell phone of the chaos unfolding inside before climbing back out less than a minute later.

They stopped to thank Capitol police officers for their service on the way out of the building.

Despite imposing a 60-day sentence, U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan described both women as “decent people” who got caught up in the moment and assured them that he would recommend they serve their terms in halfway houses typically used to transition inmates after prison terms rather than in a federal detention facility.

Still, said Poprik on Thursday, Bancroft’s actions that day couldn’t be ignored.

“Like all Americans we deeply value the freedom to peacefully assemble and express our political opinion,” Poprik said. “However, the actions taken on Jan. 6, 2021 by Ms. Bancroft, including breaking into the Capitol, go well beyond peaceful assembly.”

Bancroft did not immediately respond to requests for comment.