Pelosi, Democrats using riots to curb civil liberties, suppress free speech: Analyst

A former US diplomat says the Republicans and Democrats are the two sides of the same coin, and that US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as well as her party colleagues are taking advantage of the recent riots in Washington, DC to further curb civil liberties and suppress free speech in the country.

Michael Springmann, the former head of the US visa bureau in Saudi Arabia’s Jeddah, made the remarks in a phone interview with Press TV on Saturday as he was commenting on Democrats’ and particularly Pelosi’s reaction to the storming of the US Capitol by supporters of outgoing US President Donald Trump.

On Wednesday, armed protesters broke into the US Capitol, forcing the chamber to halt the ongoing vote to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s election win.

The violence overwhelmed police and drove Congress from its chambers. House members and senators fled the scene as shots were fired to disperse the crowd. Police later cleared US Capitol of the Trump supporters and enforced curfew.

Four dead after Trump supporters storm US Capitol

Four people were killed and 52 others were arrested as thousands of pro-Trump protesters violently stormed the US Capitol building.

Democrats and some Republicans accused Trump of sparking the violence by calling on his supporters to “fight like hell” after two months of refusal to accept his defeat in the November 3 election.

Following the Capitol invasion, Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer called for the urgent removal of Trump from power and branded him "a very dangerous person who should not continue in office."

Pelosi, Schumer call for urgent removal of Trump from power

House Speaker Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Schumer have called for the urgent removal of President Trump from power.

“Pelosi thinks she ought to be president and she ought to dictate how the American government operates; she's never accepted the fact that Donald Trump won the election in 2016, and she has spent four entire years doing her very best to overturn the government to smear Donald Trump, to smear the Republicans, to prevent the operation, the smooth operation of the American government at all levels and in all branches,” Springmann told Press TV.

“This latest issue is another attempt to smear the Republicans and gain complete control of the government for the Democratic branch of the American political party… They're both sides of the same coin,” he added.

Springmann stressed that Pelosi tried to take advantage of the recent chaos to consolidate his position as the House speaker and dash Republicans’ hopes for maintaining their lock on the Congress.

“I think that Nancy Pelosi is someone who can't be trusted, who's 80 years old and perhaps is feeling the effects of her years, I don't know but she keeps getting reelected and she keeps being re-elected as Speaker of the House of Representatives,” the former US diplomat said.

“So I think, it's more to disrupt the operation of the government, to smear any chance of the republicans ever having an opportunity to be elected and gain control with the presidency or the Congress,” he added.

Top US officials resign after Trump incited violence in Capitol

Several top US officials have resigned over Donald Trump’s support of the Capitol siege.

Springmann also pointed to the suppression of pro-Trump protesters as a ploy to further restrict free speech in the United States.

“Pelosi and company are working very hard to attack anybody who was at the demonstration wanting to block them flying on airplanes, wanting to have the FBI use cell phone tracking data to arrest them no matter where they are in the country,” he said.

“So, I think that this is the first step in increased restrictions on civil liberties in the United States, and to use one small protest, as a way of ensuring that Americans really have no constitution, no Bill of Rights anymore,” Springmann stressed.

Trump will have to leave office as Democratic President-elect Joe Biden will be inaugurated on January 20.

Experts say that the Democratic president will be facing four years of credibility crisis with millions of Americans believing Trump’s allegations of election fraud.

The riot, in which a police officer and four others died, has been widely condemned by both US and world leaders.

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