U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin said he blames President Trump for the violence that desecrated the temple to democracy that is the U.S. Capitol.
During Wednesday's ebate over objections to the electoral college vote, the Illinois Democrat said Trump wanted the mob to disrupt the constitutional process.
"The vote we're going to have here is a clear choice, of whether we are going to feed the beast of ignorance or we are going to tell the truth to the American people. We saw that beast today roaming the halls. Let's not invite it back," said Durbin.
Durbin called the U.S. Capitol building a special place.
"This is a sacred place. But this sacred place was desecrated by a mob today, on our watch. This temple to democracy was defiled by thugs," said Durbin.
Durbin also mocked a Republican proposal to create a commission to look into the election results. Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz had suggested a commission modeled on the Hayes-Tilden disputed presidential election in 1876.
Durbin said that's a bad idea.
"It was a commission that killed Reconstruction, that established Jim Crow, that even after a Civil War which tore this nation apart it re-enslaved African Americans and it was a commission that invited the voter suppression that we are still fighting today," said Durbin.
Durbin also decried President Trump's wild conspiracy theories, swatted down by the Republican secretary of state in Georgia, in an effort to convince the election official to reverse that state's election outcome.
"In any other venue that would be a simple, obvious crime," said Durbin, adding after 90 different judges reviewed Trump administration lawsuits, there was no evidence whatsoever of a rigged election.
