During an appearance on MSNBC on Sunday morning, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) drew a direct line between the rise of Donald Trump in the Republican Party to the attack on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's husband by a rightwing extremist on Friday morning that shocked the country.
He then predicted at least one lawmaker will likely be shot and possibly killed in the near future. Maybe more.
Speaking with host Katie Phang, Cohen was blunt and unsparing in his criticism of the former president for still insisting that the 2020 election was stolen from him and for inciting violence that culminated in the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
"It's happened since Trump came in in 2017. There's been a rise in incidents reported to Capitol police about the threats against congresspeople," he began. "I had a threat against me in 2019, the same person called Rep. Emanuel Cleaver in 2021, he was sentenced to two and a half years in prison last year out of Springfield Missouri. He said he had a noose for me, was going to put it around my neck and drag me behind his truck because of some remarks I made concerning Trump."
"This man that attacked Pelosi, he was antisemitic, he didn't believe that the Jan. 6 commission was valid. He didn't believe that climate change -- he was a cultist," he later explained. " He got along with all the Trump lies, and he believed in Trump."
"This is what got him to go against Pelosi," he added. "Pelosi has had threats against her life, innumerable disparaging comments by Republicans. This has contributed to an atmosphere that I think will result in more violence. I've been saying this for quite a while. I suspect another congressperson to be shot, probably killed. I expect there to be multiple killings sometime in the future around the Capitol."
Watch below:
