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A flashbang grenade explodes as law enforcement officers push back demonstrators at the US Capitol building.Credit:Bloomberg

Four people died,one of them a woman who was shot and killed inside the Capitol. Three other people died after suffering"medical emergencies"related to the breach,said Robert Contee,chief of the city’s Metropolitan Police Department.

Police said 52 people had been arrested as of Wednesday night,including 26 on the Capitol grounds. Fourteen police officers were injured,Contee said.

Democrat Zoe Lofgren,chairwoman of the House Administration Committee,said the breach"raises grave security concerns",adding that her committee will work with House and Senate leaders to review the police response — and its preparedness.

Legislators crouched under desks and donned gas masks while police tried to barricade the building when people marched to the Capitol from a rally near the White House in support of President Donald Trump. Washington’s mayor has instituted an evening curfew in an attempt to contain the violence.

Democrat Tim Ryan,chairman of the committee that controls the Capitol Police budget,said answers couldn't come soon enough about the failures of planning that allowed the protesters to burst in,and images of some officers who appeared to allow them in.

"There were clearly enormous strategic and planning failures by the Capitol Police,by the Sergeant-at-Arms and anyone else who was a part of co-ordinating this effort.

"This is the United States Capitol building,with the United States Congress in session handling the presidential election process,"said Ryan.

"There was not supposed to be anyone near the Capitol. You would be reasonably close,to be able to protest and express your view,but nobody belongs on the Capitol plaza.

"Nobody ever goes on the Capitol steps … those were illegal acts,and those people should have been immediately arrested,"he said.

Mr Ryan suggested jobs would be lost over Wednesday's violent scenes.

"I think it’s pretty clear that there are going to be a number of people who are going to be without employment very,very soon because this is an embarrassment,both on behalf of the mob and the President and the insurrection and the attempted coup,but also the lack of professional planning and dealing with what we knew was going to occur."

The rioters were egged on by Trump,who has spent weeks falsely attacking the integrity of the election and had urged his supporters to come to Washington to protest Congress’ formal approval of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory. The protests interrupted those proceedings for nearly seven hours.

The mob broke windows,entered both the Senate and House chambers and went into the offices of legislators,including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Democrat Karen Bass said she was outraged to see accounts on social media of a Capitol Police officer posing for a photo with a protester."Would you take a selfie with someone who was robbing a bank?” she asked.

"I can’t imagine if a couple of thousand of[Black Lives Matters] protesters had descended on the Capitol ... that there would be 13 people arrested."

A police spokeswoman could not immediately be reached for comment late on Wednesday.

Associated Press,Washington Post