Before Trump-backed rioters stormed the Capitol Wednesday afternoon and delayed Presidential President Joe Biden’s election certificate from the Electoral College, Cawthorn spoke at a rally in front of the White House and led the American songs. That morning, Cawthorn, who is the youngest member of Congress at the age of 25, said: tweeted “Heart of a Lion, Soul of a Patriot.”
Before he was elected in November, Republicans were concerned about Cawthorn’s youth and inexperience. He called Adolph Hitler ‘the Fuhrer’ in an Instagram message now removed from him who visited Hitler’s holiday home before his election. After the race for Cawthorn was called against Democrat Moe Davis, a former colonel of the Air Force, Cawthorn tweeted “Cry more, lib.”
In a speech before the riot, Trump called on his supporters to “be strong” and said that “you will never take back our country with weakness.” Trump on Tuesday did not back down from his remarks, calling his speech “completely appropriate.”
In December, he urged supporters to “lightly threaten” lawmakers who do not support “electoral integrity,” according to the Charlotte Observer.
“Call your congressman and feel free, you can lightly threaten them and say: you know what, if you do not start supporting electoral integrity, I will come after you, Madison Cawthorn will come after you, everyone will come after you,” according to the Observer, Cawthorn said during a Turning Point USA rally.
After the riot last week, Cawthorn exposed the violenceand call it ‘thuggery’. In the ABC-11 interview, Cawthorn said he did not support President Donald Trump’s accusation, but that rioters should be held accountable.
The riot and Cawthorn’s speech have cost him at least one prominent local supporter – the former Henderson County Sheriff George Erwin. Erwin, also the former executive director of the North Carolina Police Chiefs Association, told the newspaper that Cawthorn “ignited” the rioters.
After Twitter permanently banned Trump on Friday for what he calls a “risk of further incitement to violence,” Cawthorn tweeted that the move by the social media giant is a “morbid bastardization of the first amendment.”