US President-elect Joe Biden calls protesters ‘extremists’ and the attack on the Capitol an ‘insurrection’
- Calls for Trump to ‘defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege’
- Trump releases video that asks them to ‘go home now’, but does not denounce their actions and still falsely claims the election was ‘stolen’
US President-elect Joe Biden denounced President Donald Trump for failing to stop his supporters from storming the Capitol on Wednesday, calling them “extremists” and describing their violent acts as an “insurrection” against American democracy.
“At this hour, our democracy is under unprecedented assault,” Biden said in a speech from Wilmington, Delaware, where his transition team is based. “An assault on the citadel of liberty – the Capitol itself.”
“I call on this mob to pull back and allow the work of democracy to go forward,” he said. “I call on President Trump: go on national television now, fulfil his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege.”
Biden’s remarks came as the country and much of the world watched in shock as mobs of fervent Trump supporters overpowered US Capitol Police officers and smashed their way into the Capitol, breaking windows, climbing in and marching into the Senate chamber itself as well as the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The crowd had interrupted what was supposed to be the final step in Biden’s victory over Trump in the 2020 presidential election. In the early afternoon, a joint session of Congress began to certify the US electoral college vote, formally declaring Biden the president-elect.