Did Trump say to go up ‘peacefully and patriotically’ for the Capitol?

Did Trump say to go up ‘peacefully and patriotically’ for the Capitol?

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On January 13, President Donald Trump was indicted for the second time in the House of Representatives. He is charged with ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ and ‘engaging in insurrection or revolt against the United States’ after claiming that his Save America Rally speech on January 6, as well as his rhetoric about election fraud earlier, fueled the violence which broke out. when his supporters stormed the Capitol building the same day during the election certification.

The statement

Trump and his supporters denied this accusation, pointing out that he was asking for peaceful protests during his speech. They point to a passage in his speech in which he said to “make your voice heard peacefully and patriotically.”

The facts

At the start of his January 6 speech, Trump called on the crowd to demand that Congress “do the right thing and only count the voters who have been legally looted.”

Since the November election, Trump and many of his allies have put forward the unproven claims of mass election fraud. Former U.S. Attorney General William Barr announced in December that the Department of Justice had not uncovered evidence of widespread voter fraud that could change the outcome of the 2020 election. All the evidence presented by Trump’s team to try to prove fraud against voters was rejected and he lost 61 of the 62 lawsuits that challenged the outcome of the presidential election.

Until the official certification of election results, Trump still sent this false narrative to his most ardent supporters.

“I know that everyone here will soon be marching to the Capitol building to make your voices heard peacefully and patriotically,” Trump said in his speech. “Today we will see if Republicans stand strong for it [the] integrity of our election, but whether it stands strong for our country, our country. Our country has been under siege for a long time, much longer than this period of four years. ‘

The president does mention that he is walking to the Capitol in a peaceful way. Those defending the president also point to a call to vote out members of Congress who disagree with Trump.

“If they are not fighting, we should elect those who are not fighting,” Trump said. “You are primary. We are going to let you know who it is.”

He also said he and the crowd would ‘run down to the Capitol’ to ‘encourage our courageous senators and congressmen and women’.

“We will probably not rejoice so much for some of them, for you will never take back our country with weakness,” he said. “You have to show strength, and you have to be strong.”

However, Trump’s call to show strength shows a possible contradiction in Trump’s message to his crowd before the certification.

The official indictment points to the moments before the joint session of Congress to ratify the election results, Trump reiterated ‘false allegations that’ we won this election and we won it in a landslide ” and ‘deliberately made statements that , in context, encouraged and predictably led to lawless conduct at the Capitol. “These statements include: ‘if you do not fight like hell, you will no longer have a country.’

The resolution goes on to say that the crowd was urged by the president to illegally trespass and vandalize the Capitol, injuring and killing law enforcers, members of Congress, Vice President Mike Pence and congressional staff, threatened and killed “and engaging in other violent, deadly, destructive and riotous acts,” in an attempt to interfere “among other purposes” with the certification of the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

Others point to conflicting lines of speech that appear to be a call for the crowd to take matters into their own hands to rectify this injustice through a more active or violent approach:

  • “We have come together in the heart of the Capitol of our country for one, very basic and simple reason to save our democracy.”
  • “We will not allow them to silence your voices. We are not going to let that happen. We are not going to let that happen.”
  • “Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore and that’s what it’s about. To use a favorite term that you all really came up with, we’ll stop stealing.”
  • “That’s what they did and what they do. We will never give up. We will never give in, it will happen. You will not give in if there is theft involved.”
  • “If you catch someone cheating, you may be subject to many other rules.”
  • “Let them come out. Let the weak come out. It’s a time for strength … It’s all part of the comprehensive onslaught on our democracy and the American people to finally stand up and say ‘No’. This crowd is proof of that again. ‘
  • ‘You’ll have an illegitimate president, that’s what you’ll have. And we can not let that happen. ‘
  • “We will not be intimidated into accepting the fraud and lies we have been forced to believe over the past few weeks. We have gathered overwhelming evidence of a false election.”
  • “We’re going to see if we have great and brave leaders or not, if we have leaders who should be ashamed throughout history, and forever. They will be ashamed. And you know what? If they do the wrong thing, we should “Never forget that they did it. Never forget. We must never forget.”

While the president’s supporters believe that his mention of a march peacefully frees him from guilt, others believe that the context and intent of these and other speeches is enough to prove his guilt and justify accusation.

After the crowd entered the Capitol building, Trump took to his personal Twitter account, which has now been removed, to address his supporters.

“I know your pain,” Trump said. “I know you’re hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a big election and everyone knows it, especially the other side, but you have to go home now. ‘

He also urged his supporters to be peaceful and maintain ‘law and order’.

“Please support our Capitol Police and law enforcement,” he tweeted. “They are truly on the side of our country. Stay calm!”

In a video released on Twitter the same day, Trump told the crowd to go home and that he likes them and that they are ‘very special’. He also continued to spread the false notions that the election had been stolen from him.

The president’s immediate response to the violence in his name drew much criticism, but Trump defended his words.

“People thought what I said was completely appropriate,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

“They analyzed my speech and my words and my last paragraph, my last sentence and all, to the T, it was completely appropriate.”

He also drew attention to the reaction of Democratic leaders to the riots that erupted during the Black Live Matter protests.

“And if you look at what other people have said, politicians at a high level, about the riots during the summer, the terrible riots in Portland and Seattle and various other places, it was a real problem, they said, “Trump said. .

In a statement released a week after the riot at the Capitol, Trump said he was against violence.

He then posted a video on January 13 on the official @WhiteHouse Twitter account in which he rejected the violence, saying such actions were contrary to his beliefs and what his movement stood for. He said that “no real supporter” of him could endorse political violence, disregard law enforcement or threaten their fellow Americans. The tone apparently contradicts his initial embrace of those who stormed the Capitol a week earlier.

The government

Mostly true.

The president did say that the crowd would march peacefully and patriotically to the Capitol. After the attack, Trump said he did not condone violence.

However, this does not necessarily mean that the president did not incite violence before January 6 with the rest of his speech or in his rhetoric.

Investigation into the riot continues.

Trump Supporters Capitol Invasion Rotunda
Supporters of US President Donald Trump are walking around the Rotunda after trespassing on the US capital in Washington, DC, on January 6, 2021.
SAUL LOEB / AFP / Getty

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