Neil Cavuto Confronts Jim Jordan Over Trump’s Speech Before Riots: ‘Do You Think He Bears Any Responsibility for Lighting a Match?’
Before the Donald Trump impeachment trial officially kicked off on Tuesday, Neil Cavuto confronted Congressman Jim Jordan and repeatedly went over the former president’s incendiary rhetoric leading up to the January 6th riots to ask the Ohio Republican if he thinks Trump has any responsibility for what happened.
Jordan continued to insist that the trial is unconstitutional because Trump is no longer out of office.
He also tried to argue that “the facts are on the president’s side” because people planned to riot before he even spoke on January 6th, and even noted how Trump talked about being peaceful in that speech.
Cavuto then went through more of what Trump actually said:
“He also said we’re going to walk right now down to the Capitol and cheer on our brave senators and congressman and women, and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. And that got the strongest applause of almost anything else he said. There were other comments. Do you think intentionally or not, congressman, the president provoked a crowd that might have already been provoked with a lot of the actions you have correctly pointed out that were getting the attention of authorities who said threats were present?”
Jordan said Trump just used “normal political speech” and that Democrats have said far worse.
Cavuto again went back to Trump’s remarks and read more of what the former president said pressuring Mike Pence to singlehandedly reject the election results (something Pence could absolutely not do).
“And the crowd goes wild, absolutely wild. Do you think that is provocative language?” Cavuto asked again.
Jordan said Trump did nothing provocative, and again pointed to how Trump talked about being peaceful in the speech.
Cavuto responded, “You know, congressman, I respect you very much, but I did read the entire speech. And that peaceful demonstration comment that you made was a small part of it.”
He directly asked Jordan, “Do you think had he not sort of ginned up the crowd to the degree he was — he’s a very powerful in-your-face speaker, they were passionate — would we have the same outcome?”
“Do you think he bears any responsibility for lighting a match?”
Jordan again said Trump bears zero responsibility for what happened and the bigger question should be “why wasn’t there adequate protection and safeguards put in place.”
When Cavuto asked about censuring Trump instead of convicting him, Jordan said the trial — charging Trump with incitement of insurrection after his many false claims about a stolen election riled up supporters to the point where a mob of them stormed Capitol hill — is about “an obsession by the Democrats” against the former president.
You can watch above, via Fox Business Network.
