Top Republicans move to protect Trump from Capitol attack fallout – By Hugo Lowell (The Guardian) / Aug 5 2021
Some party leaders blamed the former president in the charged moments after the insurrection – but are now embarking on a campaign of revisionism
Top Republicans in Congress are embarking on a new campaign of revisionism seven months after the attack on the Capitol, absolving Donald Trump of responsibility and blaming the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, for the 6 January insurrection perpetrated by a mob of Trump supporters.
Some House and Senate Republican leaders stated in the charged moments immediately following the attack that Trump was squarely to blame, and amid blood and shattered glass at the US Capitol, some even considered his removal.
“The president bears responsibility,” the House Republican leader, Kevin McCarthy, said of Trump at the time, demanding that he “accept his share of responsibility”.
But after nearly 200 House Republicans voted to clear Trump in his unprecedented second impeachment and Senate Republicans scuttled a 9/11-style commission to investigate the events of 6 January, the Republican party made a call to shift all blame away from Trump.
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