MADISON, Wis (AP) – Republican US Senator Ron Johnson in Wisconsin disregarded the storms of the US Capitol last month and said on conservative talk radio that it ‘does not seem to me an armed uprising’.
Johnson’s comments on WISN-AM in Milwaukee come after he voted Saturday to acquit former President Donald Trump in his second indictment. Johnson said in the interview that Trump’s attorneys “pointed out” legal arguments raised by Democrats to convict Trump of inciting the uprising.
Johnson is one of Trump’s most ardent supporters. He will be re-elected in 2022, but has not yet said whether he will seek a third term.
Johnson condemned the violence and five deaths during the January 6 riot, but said what happened was not an armed uprising.
“When you hear the word ‘armed,’ do you not think of firearms? “Johnson said.” Here are the questions I would like to ask: how many firearms were confiscated? How many shots were fired? I’m only aware of one, and I’ll defend that law enforcement man because he took that shot. It was a tragedy, but I think “There was only one. If it was a planned armed uprising, man, you really had a bunch of idiots.”
Law enforcement officials said in court reports that guns, bombs and other weapons were found on people storming the Capitol, in their vehicles and elsewhere. The rebels also used flagpoles, stolen police screens, crutches, fire extinguishers, sticks and other objects to attack police officers and force access to the Capitol.
The Senate acquitted Trump of a charge of “incitement to insurrection” after House prosecutors filed a lawsuit alleging he was an “instigator” who unleashed a mob through a month-long campaign to spread the word. spreading outrageous conspiracy theories and false violent rhetoric that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
Graphic videos played during the trial for senators showed rioters threateningly calling for House President Nancy Pelosi and former President Mike Pence, who led the certification process in January.
“The racial genocide, the attack on police officers, the injuries, the loss of life, no one condemns it, we condemn it all,” Johnson said Monday. But he said the Democrats are hypocrites because they did not speak out after sometimes violent protests last summer following police violence against black people, including in Kenosha after Jacob Blake, a black man, was shot by a white officer is.
“We know who is talking to us and saying how important police officers are when the party says they are defending the police,” Johnson said. ‘So you’re sitting in the trial, you’re listening to all this and you understand it’s dripping with hypocrisy. ”
Wisconsin’s other senator, Democrat Tammy Baldwin, voted to convict Trump.