“Be the greatest man here and stop – take action,” said Sterling at the time. “Tell your supporters, don’t be violent, don’t intimidate. All of this is wrong, it’s anti-American.”
“When I was talking about it originally, you can see it happening, but then you think, there is no way it can happen. And then it happened,” said Sterling. “I hate to be right. I am disgusted to be right.”
“We have to go back to a point where we may have disagreements, but the other side is not going to set you on fire,” he continued. “This is true for Republicans on the far right and Democrats on the far left who believe the other side is essentially bad.”
Sterling was visibly moved during his press conference in December, when he described an incident in which a video of a Dominion Voting Machines contractor in Gwinnett County was released online with allegations of vote rigging. After the video circulated, the man was charged with treason and found a noose outside his home. The man’s family members received death threats, Sterling said.
But Trump continued to spread his fraud conspiracy theories, culminating in his January 6 rally speech that preceded the U.S. Capitol rebellion, which left five dead, including a Capitol Police officer.
Only after pleading with Congressional aides and allies within the besieged Capitol that day did Trump release a video urging protesters to “go home” while still fanning their baseless complaints about a stolen election.
“I have a job here in Georgia that I need to do. But of course, if, you know, you get to that point, I don’t know if I have a choice in the matter.”
CNN’s Rebekah Riess contributed to this report.