Journalist and commentator Megyn Kelly said the media misrepresented the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol to attack supporters of former President Donald Trump.
Kelly accused the media of malpractice during Monday’s episode of her podcast, “The Megyn Kelly Show,” while interviewing comedian Chrissie Mayr. Mayr attended the rally then President Trump held before the riot, and she was near the Capitol as it stormed.
As the host and comedian began discussing January 6, Mayr said that the rally she witnessed was nothing like what was portrayed by the media. Describing her experience of the Trump rally beforehand, Mayr said: “It was, like, mostly the most chill thing ever. It was like people had blankets and picnics and families and costumes.”
Kelly then broke in to say that the media has used the riot to generalize all Trump supporters as those few who stormed the U.S. Capitol.
“There’s no question the media represented this as so much worse than it actually was,” Kelly said. She then went on to describe and condemn the actions inside the Capitol taken by those who stormed it.
“We’ve all seen the video of people screaming in the face of cops and being totally disparaging and defecating on the floor of the U.S. Capitol,” Kelly said. “And lawmakers were understandably afraid, you know? Not like [Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)], ‘I need therapy for the rest of my life’ afraid. But I could understand it, and I didn’t like seeing it at all.”
“That’s our Capitol. Get the hell out of there. Have some respect. Don’t threaten the cops, screw you,” Kelly continued. “The MAGA crowd is supposed to be pro-cop, you know, you don’t get in their faces and say all that s***ty stuff which I heard with my own ears.”
The host then ripped into the media for using the Capitol riot to malign all Trump supporters as well as target prominent backers of the former president to blacklist them from other opportunities, such as other lines of work or book deals.
“But that doesn’t mean that’s what the entire crowd was there for, intended to do, so they got tarred by the actions of, like, some losers who went a different way. And then the media did what it does which is any bad behavior gets attributed to the entire group of Trump supporters, not just at the Capitol, but in the country,” Kelly said. “Remember? After that it was like, ‘you’re a MAGA supporter, you’re a Trump supporter, you’re on the banned list.’ It wasn’t just like ‘did you storm the Capitol?’ it was like if you voted from Trump, you’re banned. You’re not getting book deals, you’re not getting anything.”
Even before the January 6 riot, prominent figures such as Ocasio-Cortez were calling for “Trump sycophants” should be marked in case they attempt to “downplay their complicity” in the future.”
“Is anyone archiving these Trump sycophants for when they try to downplay or deny their complicity in the future? I foresee decent probability of many deleted Tweets, writings, photos in the future,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted on November 6, 2020.