Kevin McCarthy struggles to respond when asked 'what have we learned' about the Capitol riots after his release of the Jan. 6 tapes
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- House Speaker Kevin McCarthy defended releasing Jan. 6 footage to Tucker Carlson.
- The Fox News host has used the footage to downplay the violence of the riot.
- Republicans and Democrats have criticised the release of the footage.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy deflected when asked what new information was revealed about the Capitol riots by the stash of tapes he had given to Fox News host Tucker Carlson.
In an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Sunday Morning Futures, McCarthy defended his decision to release 41,000 hours of Capitol surveillance footage from the January 6, 2021, riot.
"Do you have any regrets about that," Bartiromo asked McCarthy. "And what have we learned from these tapes that have been on Tucker Carlson Tonight?"
—Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 12, 2023
"My goal here is transparency, and we will slowly roll out to every individual news agency," McCarthy said.
"They can come see the tapes as well. The first thing I found is the January 6th Committee was not honest with us. That it's not 14,000 hours of tapes, there's 41,000 hours of tapes. Let everyone see them to bring their own judgment."
McCarthy then swerved to saying more of the protestors during the 2020 George Floyd demonstrations should have faced criminal charges.
"I think we should have equal justice across this country and we should have transparency," he said.
The January 6 riots, in which Trump supporters stormed the Capitol as Joe Biden's victory in the presidential election was being certified, has been the subject of several conspiracy theories.
Carlson has attempted to downplay the violence of the riot by broadcasting carefully-selected parts of the footage. He has argued the footage "does not show an insurrection or a riot in progress", but rather "mostly peaceful chaos".
The Democratic-led Jan. 6 Committee last year found that Trump and his allies were responsible for instigating the riot, in which Capitol Police officers were attacked by Trump supporters.
The chief of the Capitol Police, the White House and Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have all criticized Carlson for presenting a misleading picture of the riots through his use of the footage.
Around 1,000 people have been charged with crimes in relation to the event.