The Senate acquitted President Donald Trump of both of the House Democrats’ impeachment charges on Wednesday. Thus, Thursday was Trump’s first opportunity to offer his thoughts on the trial and he didn’t hold back. Beginning at the annual National Prayer Breakfast and continuing through to a White House event held at noon, Trump unloaded on those who have engaged in an unending effort to do everything in their power to resist and remove him from office.

As is often the case with Trump, decorum and etiquette fail to restrain him from expressing his thoughts and feelings. This aspect of Trump’s personality can be both refreshing and grating at the same time. It produces easy fodder for his critics to attack him while also endearing him to supporters who relate to his message, and yesterday was a prime example.

At the prayer breakfast, an event intended as an apolitical occasion where members from both parties come together, Trump, after some brief introductory remarks, began to open up. “As everybody knows, my family, our great country, and your president have been put through a terrible ordeal by some very dishonest and corrupt people,” he said. “They have done everything possible to destroy us and, by so doing, very badly hurt our nation. They know what they are doing is wrong, but they put themselves far ahead of our great country.”

Trump also alluded to both Sen. Mitt Romney and Speaker Nancy Pelosi in his criticism, stating, “I don’t like people who use their faith as justification for doing what they know is wrong. Nor do I like people who say ‘I pray for you’ when they know that is not so.”

However, near the end of his comments, Trump struck a slightly more conciliatory tone: “To the people in this room, for the love that they show, not on religion but many religions: They’re brave, they’re brilliant, they’re fighters. They like people, and sometimes they hate people. I’m sorry. I apologize. I’m trying to learn. It’s not easy. When they impeach you for nothing, then you’re supposed to like them? It’s not easy, folks. I do my best.”

During his remarks at the White House, Trump laid the blame for both impeachment and Robert Mueller’s probe at the feet of the anti-Trump deep state and Democrat resistance. “We’ve been going through this now for over three years,” he noted. “It was evil. It was corrupt. It was dirty cops. It was leakers and liars. And it should never ever happen to another president ever.” Trump specifically highlighted the actions of former FBI Director James Comey: “It was a disgrace. Had I not fired James Comey — who was a disaster, by the way — it’s possible I wouldn’t even be standing here right now. We caught them in the act — dirty cops, bad people. If this happened to President Obama, a lot of people would’ve been in jail for a long time already — many, many years.”

No question Trump is and will always be a fighter.