Former President Donald Trump appeared in a Washington, D.C., courtroom on Thursday, where he pleaded not guilty to charges that he used “unlawful means” to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
The former president was hit with charges of conspiracy to defraud the United States; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction; and conspiracy against the right to vote and to have one’s vote counted.
Trump addressed the proceedings in a brief statement at Washington’s Reagan National Airport before he boarded his plane back to New Jersey. Trump has maintained that he is the rightful winner of the 2020 election and that the election was rigged in Biden’s favor.
“This is the persecution of the person that’s leading by very, very substantial numbers in the Republican primary and leading Biden by a lot,” he said. “So if you can’t beat ’em, you persecute ’em or you prosecute ’em. We can’t let this happen in America.”
