Conservative media downplays incident

New York – American conservative media has played down the gravity of the storming of the US Capitol by a mob supporting outgoing President Donald Trump, citing anger at the establishment and accusing the hard left – without proof – of having infi ltrated the crowd.

Trump supporters broke into Congress as a session was being held on Wednesday to certify Joe Biden’s November election win, triggering unprecedented chaos and violence at the heart of American democracy, as well as accusations the president was attempting a coup.

As well as Fox News, new ultra-conservative outlets battling to nibble market share from the television news behemoth sought to dissociate Trump supporters from the chaos in Congress.

The demonstrators “pushed and shoved but for the most part, that was about it”, said Kevin Corke, a Fox News reporter.

“Most of what we saw was beautiful today,” said Ben Bergquam, a reporter for the small online channel Real America’s Voice, on Wednesday.

Outlets including Real America’s Voice, Newsmax and the One America News Network (OAN) – which Trump has recommended several times in recent weeks – claimed without any evidence that the crowd had been infi ltrated by small ultra-left groups.

“I think they were undercover

Antifa,” Gina Loudon, presenter for Real America’s Voice, said of the rioters she encountered on Wednesday in the corridors of the Capitol.

Antifa is a mostly unstructured group of left-wing activists who are frequently denounced as violent troublemakers by Trump and his supporters.

Pat Fallon, a Republican in the House of Representatives, told Newsmax “we don’t even know who was on the other side of those doors” among the rioters.

While denouncing the violence committed in the precincts of Congress, Greg Kelly, of Newsmax, said it nonetheless followed a certain logic.

“If you steal an election,” he explained, echoing Trump’s discredited accusations, “there are going to be a lot of angry people.”

“There’s a reason this is happening,” said Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson. “It is happening because the people with all the power have decided to clamp down so harshly on the population that things explode at a certain point.”

For Eric Greitens of Real America’s Voice, the forced interruption to debates in Congress Wednesday “gives the president a few more days to demonstrate that there has been fraud”.

Many others have denounced the reaction of the mainstream media.

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