Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) refused to blame Donald Trump and his supporters for attacking the Capitol on Jan. 6, choosing instead to criticize Democrats for “exploiting this anniversary” by trying to protect American democracy.
“January 6th 2021 was a dark day for Congress and our country,” McConnell said in a statement on the one year anniversary of the riot. “The United States Capitol, the seat of the first branch of our federal government, was stormed by criminals who brutalized police officers and used force to try to stop Congress from doing its job.”
McConnell then criticized Democrats for trying to change Senate rules to pass voting protections with a simple majority vote to combat restrictive voting laws passed by Republican controlled state legislatures across the country in response to the ‘Big Lie,’ that the election was illegitimate because Trump lost.
“It has been stunning to see some Washington Democrats try to exploit this anniversary to advance partisan policy goals that long predated this event,” McConnell added. “It is especially jaw-dropping to hear some Senate Democrats invoke the mob’s attempts to disrupt out country’s norms, rules and institutions as a justification to discard our norms, rules and institutions themselves.”
It is a stunning about face for McConnell who denounced the riot in the days after the attack and blamed Trump saying he was “practically and morally” responsible for it.
However, McConnell voted against Trump’s conviction in the Senate after he was impeached by a bipartisan majority in the House for inciting the insurrection.
