Kamala Harris on Tuesday attempted to tie the January 6 attack on the US Capitol to Donald Trump’s past rhetoric after the former president appeared to downplay his role in the riot.
“For everyone watching, who remembers what January 6 was, I say, ‘We don’t have to go back.’ Let’s not go back. We’re not going back. It’s time to turn the page. And if that was a bridge too far for you, well, there is a place in our campaign for you,” she said on the debate stage in Philadelphia.
“Let’s remember Charlottesville,” she said, referring to the White nationalists, neo-Nazis and other right-wing groups who descended on the Virginia city in 2017 to protest its decision to remove a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, with some chanting, “Jews will not replace us.” One of the attendees rammed his car into a crowd, killing a 32-year-old paralegal and injuring several others. Trump was widely condemned at the time for declaring that there were “very fine people” on both sides of the demonstrations.
“Let’s remember that when it came to the Proud Boys, a militia, the former president said, ‘Stand back and stand by,’” Harris added, referring to a remark Trump made at a 2020 presidential debate. Asked to condemn White supremacists, Trump instead used his allotted time to blame what he called “antifa and the left” for violence and to tell the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.”
“Let’s turn the page on this. Let’s not go back. Let’s chart a course for the future and not go backwards to the past,” Harris said.
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