It was an attempted coup. It is the fault of Trump and the Republican facilitators of him.
Let's be clear: What happened on Wednesday afternoon at the United States Capitol was an attempted coup, incited by a lawless president desperately trying to hold on to power and encouraged by his cynical Republican facilitators in Congress.
Perhaps it was inevitable that President Donald Trump's chaotic and incompetent term would end amid riots and tear gas. Since British General Robert Ross set fire to the President's residence and the Capitol building in 1814, we have not seen such a scene in the sacred citadel of our democracy: an angry and disillusioned crowd driven into frenzy by its own. Trump, who forced his way into the Capitol to interrupt the official certification of Trump's electoral defeat.
The images of this shameful day will last forever: crowds storming security barricades, smashing windows to storm the seat of American power, and Capitol cops overwhelmingly outnumbered and caught off guard. Policemen inside the House of Representatives pointing their weapons at the main doors as protesters threatened to break in. A handkerchief-clad troublemaker, sitting smugly in the chair where, an hour earlier, Vice President Mike Pence had presided over the Senate.
The peaceful and orderly transfer of power, the central act of our democracy, could not be realized. The rioters are to blame, who must take responsibility for their own actions. But above all, Trump is to blame. Also to Republican members of Congress, who sought to advance their own political careers by validating Trump's paranoid and selfish fantasies.
I mean you, Josh Hawley, Senator from Missouri. And you, Ted Cruz, senator from Texas. And you, Steve Scalise, representative of Louisiana. And to everyone else who thought that the way to succeed in the Republican Party was to pretend to believe Trump's lies instead of telling the nation the truth.
Trump told his MAGA legions that he did not lose the election, that in fact he could not have lost, and that he would manage to remain his president for a second term. First, it would be the counts that would save him, until everyone confirmed Joe Biden's victory. Then the certifications of the total votes, but all the states certified their results. Later the courts would come to the rescue, but courts at all levels, including the Supreme Court, dismissed their frivolous claims as if they were scrap paper. Finally, on January 6, Congress - or perhaps Pence, acting alone - would surely discard electoral votes from states that Trump falsely claimed to have "won," thereby giving him the glorious victory he deserved. He urged his followers to go to Washington to "stop the robbery": to prevent Congress from fulfilling its constitutional duty to count electoral votes. And Hawley, Cruz, Scalise, and many other Republicans in Congress agreed with this ridiculous fairy tale so as not to anger the president or his followers.
But it came on January 6. Pence issued an early statement making it clear that he would obey the Constitution, not Trump's autocratic wishes. And the thousands of Trump supporters who had gathered to hear him give a long, angry spiel, and who obeyed his order to march to the Capitol, became a guided missile aimed at the heart of American democracy.
They were like an apocalyptic cult waiting for an asteroid that, when the appointed day arrives, does not hit. Trump had convinced them that he couldn't lose, but inside the Capitol he was losing. They decided to prevent the transfer of power by force. Shots were fired and one person was killed. Tear gas was fired. The scenes were like the ones I saw in places like Paraguay and Peru as a correspondent, and nothing like what we've seen in the United States.
Biden delivered a televised speech calling for an end to the "insurrection" and the restoration of "decency, honor, respect and the rule of law." Trump posted a disjointed video statement online, urging rioters to "go home," but repeating his claims that the election was "stolen."
It is possible to see better days ahead. Biden is a good man and a lifelong public servant. Georgia voters have given the Republican Party the punishment it deserves by putting Democrats in control of the White House and both houses of Congress. It's only two weeks until the opening day.
But, somehow, our damaged nation has to survive the next two weeks. The Police and the National Guard are more than capable of restoring order to the streets. Yet the wounds that Trump has inflicted on the nation run deep. We will pay for the mistake of electing this bitter and twisted man as president for a long, long time.
