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The consequence of these conspiracies became manifest on January 6, 2021, when hundreds of Trump supporters, encouraged by right-wing media and Donald Trump, stormed the U.S. Capitol in a deadly insurrection aimed at overturning the election. There was a time in the United States that such startling violence would have bought at least a few days of unity. But with blood still drying on the Capitol floor, more than one hundred Republican members of Congress voted to overturn the election and spread conspiracies about a βfalse-flagβ operation that had already begun to circulate within right-wing media. Over the next twenty-four hours, hosts went on air to denounce the violence, then immediately began to argue, falsely, that left-wing agitators and Antifa were responsible for the insurrection.
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Julian E. Zelizer (The Presidency of Donald J. Trump: A First Historical Assessment)