MSNBC cut off a clip of President Trump defending his speech at the “Save America” rally on Jan. 6 that ended in a riot at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump told reporters Tuesday that his speech was viewed as “totally appropriate” and spoke about how elected officials discussed the summer riots when he was cut off.
“If you read my speech — and many people have done it, and I’ve seen it both in the papers and in the media, on television — it’s been analyzed, and people thought that what I said was totally appropriate,” Trump said before talking about the response to the George Floyd protests.
MSNBC host Hallie Jackson said the network cut away from the clip because the president wasn’t telling the truth in his defense.
“We are coming out of this now because the president has started to — as he occasionally does, often does — veer away from the truth,” Jackson said. “His video that he taped on Wednesday after the riots were happening at the Capitol was not viewed widely as ‘totally appropriate’ — in fact, many people argued they were highly inappropriate and that he told the people who were rioting, the mob who was descending on the Capitol, that they were ‘very special’ and that he ‘loved them.'”
Trump’s video message following the riot was taken down on various social media platforms. The president’s personal accounts were also suspended by others and permanently banned on Twitter. In the video, Trump urged protesters to “peacefully” go home, adding that he “loved them” and that they were “very special.”
The riot, which occurred in the evening of Jan. 6, left five people, including a Capitol Hill police officer, dead. After Congress was able to reconvene and certify President-elect Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election, Trump vowed for a peaceful transfer of power on Jan. 20.
