Rioters storm the U.S. Capitol Wednesday following a rally with President Donald Trump.
College and university leaders across the country responded to the violent chaos at the U.S. Capitol Wednesday using unusually strong terms for higher education leaders. Many college presidents said they were saddened and frightened by the sight of supporters of President Donald Trump storming the U.S. Capitol and condemned the rioters’ actions on Twitter and in statements or emails to students and employees.
"I want to be clear: the storming of the Capitol complex is not merely a brazen act by a relatively small group of instigators. It is the direct result of a campaign to sow mistrust in our democracy and to overturn an election that was by all reasonable accounts conducted freely and fairly," Vincent Price, president of Duke University in Durham, N.C., said in an email to the campus. "These events are made all the more shameful by their futility -- they are based on falsehoods and conspiracies that have been rejected in local, state and federal courts across the country, and they simply will not change the outcome of our democratic process."