House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said during an interview that every American carries part of the blame for the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters, singling out Democratic congresswoman Maxine Waters and law enforcement for the incident.
McCarthy made his comments in an interview to be aired this Sunday on “Full Court Press With Greta Van Susteren,” noted Huffington Post reporter Amanda Terkel.
After claiming that Trump told his supporters to protest “peacefully,” McCarthy argued that “everybody across this country has some responsibility” for the eincident. He then started pointing to Democrats who opposed Trump, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), people who are rude on social media and law enforcement authorities who didn’t prepare for the attack as some of the people who were somehow responsible.
“I think this is what we have to get to the bottom of, and when you start talking about who has responsibilities, I think there’s going to be a lot more questions, a lot more answers we have to have in the coming future,” he said.
McCarthy’s argument that Trump didn’t provoke the mob is in direct contradiction to what Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has said.
“The mob was fed lies,” McConnell said Wednesday. “They were provoked by the president and other powerful people, and they tried to use fear and violence to stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the federal government which they did not like.”
Kevin McCarthy appeared to backtrack from his initial criticism of Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 riot, as @ArthurDelaneyHP wrote about https://t.co/UrtCmEaxjx But in his @greta interview, he claims there was no inconsistently and tries to explain pic.twitter.com/DJjhFfSOYy
— Amanda Terkel (@aterkel) January 23, 2021
