Addressing the demonstrators, Trump said "I know you're hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election and everyone knows it."
But the president insisted that protesters retreat, saying: "We have to have peace. So go home. We love you. You're very special."
His full comments below:
"I know your pain, I know your hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election, and everyone knows it, especially the other side. But you have to go home now. We have to have peace, we have to have law and order, we have to respect our great people in law and order. We don’t want anybody hurt. It’s a very tough period of time. There’s never been a time like this where such a thing happened, where they could take it away from all of us -- from me, from you, from our country. This was a fraudulent election, but we can’t play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace. So go home, we love you, you’re very special, you’ve seen what happens, you’ve seen the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel, but go home and go home in peace.”
Twitter quickly locked down the tweet, making it impossible to be retweeted or liked "due to a risk of violence."
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 6, 2021
To be sure, Trump previously expressly tweeted for demonstrators to "[p]lease support our Capitol Police and Law Enforcement" and "for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful."
Ahead of Trump's video, Joe Biden appeared on TV and called on President Donald Trump to go on television to demand an end to what he called a “siege” of the U.S. Capitol.
“The scenes of chaos at the Capitol do not reflect a true America,” Biden said Wednesday in a speech in Wilmington, Delaware. “They do not represent who we are. What we are seeing is a small number of extremists dedicated to lawlessness.”
“I call on this mob to pull back allow the work of democracy to go forward,” he said. “I call on President Trump to go on national television now to fulfill his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege.”
Biden said that presidents “at their worst can incite” action, without directly blaming Trump for his political supporters storming the Capitol, disrupting congressional certification of Biden’s Electoral College victory.
“It’s not a protest,” Biden said. “It’s an insurrection.”
Meanwhile, President Trumo
