Metropolitan Police Department officer Daniel Hodges, who was crushed in a doorway on Jan. 6, recalled how he had to wrestle with one rioter who tried to take his baton and another shouted at him, "'You will die on your knees.'"

Hodges, as Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn has before, called the rioters "terrorists" throughout his testimony.

"The terrorists alternated between attempting to go break our defense and shouting at or attempting to convert us," he said.

He recounted in detail how rioters beat him while he was trapped in a doorway.

"Directly in front of me, a man seized the opportunity of my vulnerability, grabbed the front of my gas mask and used it to beat my head against the door," he said. "He never uttered any words but opted instead for guttural screams. I remember him foaming at the mouth."

In powerful testimony, Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone, who was dragged down the Capitol steps, beaten with a flagpole and tased repeatedly on Jan. 6, recalled how rioters chanted, "kill him with his own gun" as he was being beaten and lying on the ground.

"I said as loud as I could manage ‘I've got kids,'" he testified.

Fanone didn’t hold back when calling out lawmakers who have blocked efforts for an investigation, slamming his fist on the witness table when he said, "The indifference shown to my colleagues is disgraceful."

"I feel like I went to hell and back to protect them and the people in this room, but too many are now telling me that hell doesn't exist or that hell actually wasn't that bad," he said.

"Nothing, truly nothing, has prepared me to address those elected members of our government who continue to deny the events of that day, and in doing so betray their oath of office," he added.

Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell was the first to speak of the four officers and described the day as a scene "from a medieval battlefield."

"I could feel myself losing oxygen and recall thinking to myself 'this is how I’m going to die, trampled defending this entrance,'" he said in an emotional testimony.

Gonell described the verbal and physical attacks as horrific and devastating and recalled some of the language used that the officers say still haunt them.

"'If you shoot us, we all have weapons, and we will shoot back," or 'we will get our guns.' 'We outnumber you, join us,' they said. I also heard specific threats on the lives of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and then-Vice President Mike Pence,” he recalled.

Earlier, when video of the Capitol attack played, the four uniformed witnesses fidgeted in their seats, and Gonell appeared to tear up, wiping his eyes. At one point, Metropolitan Police Department officer Michael Fanone leaned over and whispered something in his ear, clasping his shoulder.

In her opening statement, Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., said the panel's first choice was to have an independent, bipartisan commission not made up of lawmakers to investigate the attack -- but that effort was killed by Republican leadership.

"That leaves us where we are today. We cannot leave the violence of Jan. 6 and its causes uninvestigated," she said. "If those responsible are not held accountable, and if Congress does not act responsibly, this will remain a cancer on our constitutional republic."

Cheney also reminded that Republicans had "recognized the events that day for what they actually were" in the days after the attack, even if members downplay it now, but said the committee's work is just beginning.

"We must issue and enforce subpoenas promptly," she said. "We must overcome the many efforts we are already seeing to cover up and obscure the facts."

She then called out to every member of Congress to ask themselves: "Will we adhere to the rule of law, respect the rulings of our courts, and preserve the peaceful transition of power? Or will we be so blinded by partisanship that we throw away the miracle of America? Do we hate our political adversaries more than we love our country and revere our Constitution?"

She added, "I pray that we all remember, our children are watching, as we carry out the solemn and sacred duty entrusted to us. They will know who stood for truth. They will inherit the nation we hand to them -- a republic, if we can keep it."