Fox News host Jesse Watters rebuked Juan Williams during a Wednesday afternoon broadcast of “The Five.”
Watters — along with cohosts Greg Gutfeld and Dana Perino — took issue with Williams‘ conclusion after the second day of President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, accusing him of attempting to lump even his cohosts in with those who supported the January 6 assault on the Capitol. (RELATED: Juan Williams Appears To Blame National Guard Parking Garage Debacle On Donald Trump)
WATCH:
Williams gave his assessment of the trial so far, saying that he believed the House Impeachment Managers had done a thorough job of laying out their case that Trump had incited the rioters who attacked the Capitol.
“To me, it’s chilling. It was chilling to hear Trump supporters at a rally saying, you know, destroy the Republican Party. It’s chilling to see his tweets attacking McConnell, threatening Vice President Pence. So this today, Wednesday, this impeachment trial you guys are all ignoring, I guess you are afraid of it because it’s a reminder —” Williams said.
“Please don’t mind read. Don’t mind read! Don’t mind read!” Gutfeld interrupted.
Williams said that he didn’t need to read minds because he had listened to the riot footage and the opening arguments.
“Then how could you be so wrong? If you listened, how could you —” Gutfeld continued.
“All right, all right, Greg, let him finish,” Watters said.
“Because I’m so right, so it seems to me that what you heard today was how Trump was attacking not only Democrats but Republicans and now he is forcing Republicans to make a choice,” Williams added. “You can stand with the mob that stormed Capitol Hill and said bleep the cops, you can join the Qanon conspiracy, you can join the Proud Boys, the violent extremists —”
“Literally no one is doing that —” Perino interrupted.
Williams went on to say that Republicans had to choose to stand with conservative principles and party leaders such as Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
“This trial to me is about whether or not Republicans want to close their eyes or they want to face the truth and right now, let me tell you. Let me tell you. Facing the truth is the way that we solve it, the way we bring the country together,” Williams said. “Ignoring problems is never the way to solve problems —”
“You shouldn’t be impugning our intentions, Juan, that is the problem,” Gutfeld shot back, as the others objected to the idea that any of them had stood with the rioters or violent extremists.
“I don’t need to impugn it, I can listen —” Williams replied.
“Then it goes into your brain and it comes out wrong, that’s on you, that’s not on us. It’s not our fault if you are getting it wrong. It’s not my problem —” Gutfeld continued.
“You don’t want to deal with the news,” Williams pushed back.
The exchange got progressively heated as the two continued to shout over each other until Watters cut in, chastising Williams.
“All right, Juan, we got to go but what you just did right there, Juan, that wasn’t cool. You are a colleague of ours and we’ve been talking about this for over a month and none of us are standing with the mob,” Watters said. “We have never stood with this mob. We have condemned it outright, we are not ignoring it —”
The panel exploded again, with everyone talking at once until Watters once again brought things to a close. “We got to go. It’s over,” he said.