On January 6 of this year, former President Donald Trump's lies about the 2020 election prompted a mob of his extremist supporters to storm the United States Capitol, hoping to upend the joint congressional session acknowledging then-President-elect Joe Biden's victory.
Despite the livestreams of prominent Trump supporters boasting about the failed siege, as well as the sea of MAGA hats and Trump flags surrounding the Capitol that day, Trump's most visible supporters have scrambled to divorce the former President's actions from their culmination.
What's more, they've repeatedly tried to dismiss the seriousness of the failed insurrection—the first siege of the Capitol in over a century—which resulted in the deaths of at least five people.
At the forefront of this effort is far-right Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who once again used his nightly broadcast to minimize the atrocities to his millions of viewers.
Watch below.
Carlson defended the failed insurrectionists in a sarcasm-drenched diatribe, saying:
"You saw what happened. It was carried live on television, every gruesome moment. A mob of older people from unfashionable zip codes somehow made it all the way to Washington, D.C., probably by bus. They wandered freely through the Capitol, like it was their building or something. They didn't have guns, but a lot of them had extremely dangerous ideas."
He continued:
"They talked about the Constitution, and something called their rights. Some of them made openly seditious claims. They insisted, for example, that the last election wasn't entirely fair. The whole thing was terrifying, and then, as you've been told so very often, they committed unspeakable acts of violence."
He went on to defend rioter Eric Munchel, who arrived to the Capitol with zip ties, potentially with the intent of handcuffing members of Congress. Carlson slammed a judge's decision to deny Munchel's release.
Carlson was slammed for his advocacy in favor of the rioters.
Others refuted his claim that the rioters were from "unfashionable zip codes."
The FBI has already arrested hundreds of those who participated in the riots.
