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White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre tore into ex-President Donald Trump’s recent remarks about January 6 rioters while he campaigned in Iowa ahead of his caucus victory.

At Tuesday’s White House press briefing, the proceedings were carried virtually due to the severe weather that has caused many high-profile schedule changes.

The conference call was moderated by an AT&T operator who made a few interesting introductions, which Jean-Pierre handled graciously:

OPERATOR: Please note at this time all audience members are in “listen only” mode to minimize background noise. There will be Q&A during this call. If you would like to ask a question, please press “#2” on your telephone keypad to be placed in the question queue.I would now like to formally begin today’s call and introduce Karine Johnson [Jean-Pierre], the White House Press Secretary. Please go ahead.MS. JEAN-PIERRE: My name is Karine Jean-Pierre, but thank you so much for the intro.

Later, the same operator had a little trouble with the name of this website, after which Jean-Pierre was asked about Trump’s “leaning into” January 6 as he campaigned his way to victory in Iowa:

OPERATOR: All right. Moving on to our next question in queue. Tommy Christopher with Meditate [Mediaite], please go ahead.TOMMY CHRISTOPHER: Yeah. Hey, Karine. It’s Tommy. How you doing?MS. JEAN-PIERRE: Hey, Tommy. Good to hear your voice. How are you?

TOMMY CHRISTOPHER: Good, good. By the way, I know you know this, but it’s “Mediaite.” We get that a lot, though — “Meditate.” So –MS. JEAN-PIERRE: (Inaudible.)TOMMY CHRISTOPHER: — good to talk to you, and good to be staying warm too. So, I — I was wondering if you could tell me what you make of — of how much former President Trump leaned into this lie that January 6th was justified while he was campaigning in Iowa and, like, demanding the release of the, quote, unquote, “hostages”…MS. JEAN-PIERRE: Yeah. Look, I want to be — always want to be very, very careful on speaking about candidate Trump, especially in the — the upcoming 2024 election.What I’ll say more broadly about the January 6th comments — look, you know, it — you know, it’s — it’s basically what the President said in Valley Forge. Right? The President said this over and over again about January 6th and how dangerous it was — right? — and how — how we had to — we had to watch, you know, an insurrec- — an insurrection, essentially — 2,000 angry mob — because they believed what the former President said and thought that they can turn over an election. This is what they were doing. That’s what they were doing at the Capitol on that day.And so, I’ve been — I said this
a couple of times. You know, I’ve said that the President has been very clear: He’s going to stand against these types of conspiracy theories.Let’s not forget, officers died. Right? Police officers died on that — because of the injuries that they sustained on that day. They were attacked on that day by these — by these — by these folks who — who were trying to take over the Capitol.And so, we have to be very clear about what happened on that day. We cannot forget about what happened on that day. And the President said this: Our democracy — we have to continue our democracy.And I’ll just repeat a little bit of what he said in his remarks — right? — there is a choice to be made. There is a choice that we have to make — right? — in — in our country. We have to make a choice, and that choice should be standing — standing up for our democracy, which is what the President is going to continue — continue to do.As far as this comment on hostages, you know, want to — want to be really careful there as well — as well. Don’t want to comment on — on any DOJ investigation or legal process.But as you’ve — you’ve seen American veterans note, it’s — it’s grotesque and offensive. It
is offensive to c- — to compare those convicted of assaulting cops and attempting to overthrow the American government that veterans have died — have died defending to — for — innocent Americans — for — to — you know, innocent Americans that — in Israel — Israelis and people of other nationalities who were abducted. Right? They were abducted by Hamas on October 7th.And so, it is — you know, I’ll just keep it there. It is — it is something that — again, I want to be mindful to speaking to, but that is — it is incredibly grotesque and offensive.

Watch above via The White House. (Excerpts via the official White House transcript)

Tags: Donald Trump, Joe Biden, John Kirby, Karine Jean-Pierre, white house briefing