Donald Trump on Tuesday dodged the question of whether he will allow for a peaceful certification of election results if Kamala Harris defeats him in three weeks.
During an interview at the Economic Club of Chicago, Bloomberg Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait asked Trump if he would commit “to respecting and encouraging a peaceful transfer of power,” especially in light of Jan. 6, 2021, which the journalist called “unruly and violent.”
Trump didn’t answer the question. Instead, he rejected the premise and blamed Micklethwait as “a man that has not been a big Trump fan over the years.” He also falsely claimed that he allowed for a peaceful transfer of power in 2020, when Joe Biden defeated him.
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“Come on, President Trump, you had a peaceful transfer of power compared to Venezuela, but it was by far the worst transfer of power for a long time,” Micklethwait insisted.
The audience booed and Trump thanked them. The former president then admitted that people were angry when they arrived in Washington to protest the results that January—but according to him, they were perfectly behaved.
“It was love and peace, and some people went to the Capitol,” Trump said. “And a lot of strange things happened there, a lot of strange things, with people being waved into the Capitol by police.”
For perhaps the first time, Trump downplayed his crowd size.
He added that he left the White House the morning he was supposed to and that only a fraction of the protestors were among those who breached and defaced the Capitol.
“Not one of those people had a gun, nobody was killed, except for Ashli Babbitt,” he said.
While no one else was shot during the riot at the Capitol, when members of Congress and Vice President Mike Pence—who rioters threatened to hang—fled to secure locations in fear for their lives, at least seven people died in connection with the event. According to Trump, that distinction is enough to call Jan. 6 “peaceful.”
“I think we should be allowed to disagree on that,” he said.
