CBS correspondent Scott MacFarlane pushed back after a C-SPAN caller claimed that the attempted insurrection on Jan. 6 "didn't happen."
During the Wednesday edition of C-SPAN's Washington Journal program, a caller from Maryland named Matt complained to MacFarlane about his in-depth reporting on Jan. 6.
"I can't believe you guys are still milking this," the caller said. "There were tons of protests across this nation, what you could call an insurrection under Trump. And there were like murders, they took over whole city blocks and called it the CHAZ. Nobody was prosecuted. We saw nothing from that."
"You guys are still talking about the Jan. 6 quote—unquote insurrection, which didn't happen," he insisted.
MacFarlane offered another perspective.
"The defendants in the Jan. 6 prosecutions have drawn a line, they say, between other riots in America, other attacks on federal complexes," he explained. "They have not done so with great success, though, because the Jan. 6 prosecution is a singular unique thing."
The reporter added: "It was an attack on the United States Capitol. There was a gallows on the west front. There were rioters chanting, 'Hang Mike Pence' within 40 to 50 feet of an evacuating, escaping Vice President Mike Pence."
"This was a singular, unique unicorn moment in American history," MacFarlane said. "It is clear and evident by what's going on in the cases."
MacFarlane later noted that he has read "tens of thousands of court filings" about Jan. 6 but the Department of Justice "hasn't even hinted" at charging former President Donald Trump.
