Speaker Johnson: Dems ‘Have Incited Violence in My View’

“It was surreal for everybody involved. When the chaos ensued, I was up actually on a platform, that raised platform around the perimeter of that giant ballroom, and I was stuck in a group taking photos of people. So I didn’t hear the gunshots. And the next thing I know, half of my security team jumps behind me, comes behind me, rushes up, grabs me by the shoulders and pushes me out the nearest exit door, which is about six feet behind us,” Johnson added.

“And that’s where you see that photo where we’re going down that hallway. The other half of my team went immediately to go grab my wife, Kelly, and get her out of another door. And we met up about 60 seconds later. They took us to our motorcade, which is in the basement of the hotel. And we just sat in the trucks there and waited for the developments for quite a while,” the Speaker continued.

He added, “And that was a long while. It was quite a scene. I told the president last night, we talked at length, and I said, I thought your tone was excellent in that press conference right after that event, and the tone that he’s had since about that. It is a moment, a sobering moment for the country. We’ve got to unify. And we’ve got to handle these things together and recognize we’re facing, you know, real threats out there. It’s a dangerous time. So it’s time for us to stand together.”

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Hemmer jumped back in and asked, “What we do know is that Susie Wiles is going to hold meetings on presidential security this week, and I imagine that cannot come soon enough. I want to share something that a Democratic senator, John Fetterman, shot out hours after this incident on Saturday night. On X, he said, ‘We were there front and center. That venue wasn’t built to accommodate an event with the line of succession for the U.S. government. After witnessing last night, drop the TDS, the Trump Derangement System, syndrome rather, and build the White House ballroom for events exactly like these.’ Are you hearing enough from your Democratic colleagues on the tone that Senator Fetterman struck there?”

“No, he’s a rare voice in that camp, and we need more of that. In fact, they’ve done the opposite. They’ve incited violence, in my view,” Johnson declared.

“I mean, you have some of the most prominent figures in the House and the Senate on the Democrat side, effectively, you know, calling for war. I mean, they use those kinds of metaphors, and it incites violence because there are crazy people in society, and they get radicalized online. And so we’ve got to recognize that. It’s time to turn down the rhetoric,” he continued.

Johnson added, “We’ve been saying this over and over, and not use that kind of language. I hope that this will be a sobering reminder for everybody about that very important cause. I’m grateful to Fetterman. He’s right. The ballroom will be a solution for this, because it’ll be on the most secure compound in the world. It won’t have hotel rooms above it, and it’ll have seven-inch-thick glass, for example, on the windows, so it’ll be a very safe environment to do events like this. We need a place. We have needed a place like that, and the president keeps pointing it out.”