Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colorado, an impeachment manager, presented video evidence before the Senate on Feb. 10 to argue that Trump began fomenting anger among his supporters well before his remarks on Jan. 6, and was therefore culpable of inciting violence on that day. “When in our history has a speech led thousands of people to storm our nation’s capitol with weapons? To scale the walls, break windows, kill a capitol police officer? This was not just a speech, it didn’t just happen,” Neguse said. He argued that Trump perpetuated a “big lie” of election fraud following his loss to Joe Biden, and showed numerous examples of when the former president made false claims of fraud during public appearances, encouraging his supporters to “fight like hell” to “stop the steal.” Neguse argued that this messaging by Trump culminated in the events of Jan. 6, during which the former president told a crowd of supporters to “make no mistake, this election was stolen from you, from me, and from the country.” “The president had spent months telling his supporters the election had been stolen, and he used this speech to incite them further,” Neguse said, adding that the rioters had been primed to attack the Capitol over a period of many months.
Neguse is one of the House Democrats making his case for why the Senate should convict former President Donald Trump on a charge of inciting insurrection during the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump was impeached by the House in January, while he was still in office.
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