COLUMBIA, SC (AP) – Former President Donald Trump says footage of the brutal beating of Tyr Nichols by five Memphis police officers is “horrible” and the attack “should never have happened.”
Trump said in an interview with The Associated Press on Saturday that Nichols was “simply being beaten up” and that the beating was “vicious and violent and hard to believe.”
Trump’s comments came a day after officers released footage of a 29-year-old black man being attacked after a traffic stop.
Trump was president when George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police.
He condemned the killing at the time but later centered his re-election campaign around a message of “law and order” and support for law enforcement.
