At a Monday press conference at the White House, Biden administration press secretary Jen Psaki again faced dubious-at-best questions from Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy, who consistently seems determined to wreak as much havoc in the White House briefing room as possible. This time, Doocy asked about the case of Kyle Rittenhouse, the teenager who shot and killed two individuals amid anti-police brutality protests in Wisconsin last year. Rittenhouse was on trial for homicide this week in Wisconsin, and Biden has previously seemed, at least to some observers, to characterize him as a white supremacist — although conservatives have rushed to Rittenhouse’s defense, citing supposed principles of self-defense and gun rights.
Initially, Doocy asked as follows:
‘Why did President Biden suggest that Kyle Rittenhouse, on trial in Kenosha, is a white supremacist?’
Psaki — after appearing to audibly sigh — replied with the following succinct take-down:
‘So Peter, what I’m not going to speak to right now is anything about an ongoing trial, nor the president’s past comments. What I can reiterate for you is the president’s view that we shouldn’t have, broadly speaking, vigilantes patrolling our communities with assault weapons. We shouldn’t have opportunists corrupting peaceful protests by rioting and burning down the communities they claim to represent — anywhere in the country.’
Doocy reiterated a similar thread from his line of questioning, asking whether Rittenhouse’s mother was correct when she said that Biden characterized Kyle as a white supremacist in order to win votes. Obviously, there’s no reasonable scenario in which Psaki would have agreed with Doocy’s suggestion, so his questioning appeared to be in bad faith right from the start. Psaki declined to add any further comments, again citing the fact that it’s an ongoing case. Check out the interaction below:
Psaki: I’m not going to speak to an ongoing trial. What I can reiterate for you is the President’s view that we shouldn’t have(broadly speaking)vigilantes patrolling our communities with assault weapons. We shouldn’t have opportunists corrupting peaceful protests by rioting pic.twitter.com/A30PNX2IsF
— Acyn (@Acyn) November 15, 2021
The acceptance among conservatives of Rittenhouse’s violence fits into a broader pattern of right-wing extremism. Repeatedly, Trump himself has openly defended those who perpetrated violence at the Capitol in January for the purpose of fighting imaginary election fraud. Trump even specifically defended those who chanted “Hang Mike Pence!” amid the riot crowd, saying that anger at the then-vice president was reasonable over his refusal to go along with efforts to overturn the presidential election results.
