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Its hard to think of a more poignant split screen, or one that revealed more about this moment in American politics, than the one that appeared on Friday afternoon.

On one side, from the White House, was a ceremony honoring heroes who two years ago fought former President Donald Trumps coup attempt at the ballot box, during the vote count and, finally, with the Jan. 6 assault on Capitol Hill.

Among those receiving the Presidential Citizens Medal were Michael Fanone, Eugene Goodman and Caroline Edwards, three former officers who defended the Capitol building from Trump-supporting insurrectionists. Also at the ceremony were Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, the mother and daughter election workers from Atlanta whom Trump singled out in his remarks and who faced death threats afterwards.

HuffPosts S.V. Date has the full story, including some of the remarks by President Joe Biden.

History will remember your names, Biden said, addressing the award winners, along with the families of three officers who died after the insurrection and are receiving the medal posthumously. What you did was truly consequential.

The other half of the split screen was from the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, on Capitol Hill, where the House was in the middle of its 13th vote on the next speaker and California Republican Kevin McCarthy still had not locked up the votes he needed.

By now, youre probably familiar with the backstory to this drama: It takes a majority of voting members of the House to become speaker. Because Republicans control the chamber by the thinnest of margins, and because Democrats arent going to vote for a Republican, the GOP caucus needs near unanimity to pick a leader.