She made her remarks while addressing San Francisco constituents during an online video conference.
By David Isaac, World Israel News
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Saturday said that the rioters who broke into the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday chose “their whiteness over democracy,” AP reports.
She made her remarks while addressing San Francisco constituents during an online video conference.
Her comments came after she spoke about the high-death rate from coronavirus on Wednesday and Thursday, which were single-day highs, The Hill reports.
“When that assault was taking place on the Capitol, 3,865 people in our country died of the coronavirus, many of them people of color because of the injustice of it all,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi, in speaking about the “the Feast of the Epiphany,” a Christian holiday celebrated after Christmas, said “I thought it was going to be an epiphany for those who were in opposition of our democracy to see the light.”
“Instead, it was an epiphany for the world to see that there are people in our country, led by this President, for the moment, who have chosen their whiteness over democracy. That’s what this is about,” she said.
The Democrats have tried to paint President Donald Trump and his supporters as racists throughout his term.
In response to a Biden-Harris campaign theme that he refused to denounce white supremacist groups, the Trump campaign put out a five-minute video showing him disavowing such groups at least 38 times over the course of his presidency.
“The Biden campaign continues to sow division and inflame racial tension by spreading this false narrative,” a Trump campaign official said at the time. “Enough is enough.”
Race relations became a central theme of the campaign following the death of George Floyd, who was black, at the hands of Minneapolis police officers on May 25.
Unrest erupted in major U.S. cities in the wake of the killing and even spread abroad. Statues of famous historical figures were torn down and some two dozen people were killed in riots. The months of rioting were often led by radical leftwing groups, prominent among them Antifa.
The Jan. 6 riot at the nation’s capital appears to be the first time that a Trump riot led to violence. The Democrats are holding Trump directly responsible.
“This cannot be exaggerated. Not only the complicity, the instigation of the President of the United States, must and will be addressed,” Pelosi finished.
The Democrats are pushing ahead with a first-ever effort to impeach a president twice. “Justice will be done. Democracy will prevail. And America will be healed. But it is a decision that we have to make,” Pelosi said.
On Jan. 9, appearing on the Hannity show, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) urged President-elect Joe Biden to call Pelosi, and the Squad, a group of progressive congressmen led by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and others, and tell them to call off the impeachment effort.
“Tell them to stand down. This will destroy the country even further,” Graham said.