Former Vice President Mike Pence is unsure whether or not former President Donald Trump actually committed any crime in relation to the Jan. 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol.
“I don’t know, honestly I don’t know the full case ... that the government has. I think I’ve said on your network many times that I don’t know if taking bad advice from lawyers is a crime,” Mr. Pence said.
“It seems to me that some of the argument I hear coming between the lines from his lawyers is something of a concession that he may have gotten bad advice, that he was just taking advice from his attorneys,” he continued, adding the indictment will either “stand on its legal merits or fall.”
However, Mr. Pence later added that he believes it is best to “leave that legal process, and frankly the profound issues about the First Amendment, to the courts to sort that out.”
The former vice president’s comments came shortly after Mr. Trump was indicted by a grand jury convened by special counsel Jack Smith over his and his allies’ alleged efforts to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Charges Against Trump
The 45-page indictment charges Mr. Trump with one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, one count of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding—the Jan. 6 certification of the electoral vote—and conspiracy against the rights of citizens.Specifically, it alleges that Mr. Trump knew his claims about winning the election were “false” but that he “repeated and widely disseminated them anyway” in order to “make his knowingly false claims appear legitimate, create an intense national atmosphere of mistrust and anger and erode public faith in the administration of elections.”
Mr. Trump, who is the frontrunner in the Republican 2024 presidential race, is scheduled to appear in court in Washington, D.C. on Aug. 3 over the latest indictment. It will mark the former president’s third appearance in court as a criminal defendant.
His campaign has described the latest indictment as a politically motivated attack that they say is “nothing more than the latest corrupt chapter in the continued pathetic attempt by the Biden Crime Family and their weaponized Department of Justice to interfere with the 2024 Presidential Election, in which President Trump is the undisputed frontrunner and leading by substantial margins.”
‘History Will Hold Donald Trump Accountable’
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, a former assistant public defender known for handing down strict sentences for those involved in Jan. 6 cases—including a more than five-year prison sentence to a 56-year-old Washington resident involved in the breach—will preside over Mr. Trump’s case.While Mr. Pence said he was unclear as to whether or not Mr. Trump’s actions amounted to criminal conduct, the former vice president stressed the importance of the American people knowing what happened in the days before Jan. 6, claiming that the former president had “demanded” Mr. Pence use his authority as vice president presiding over the count of the electoral college to “essentially overturn the election by literally rejecting votes.”
“I had no authority to do that,” he said, adding “anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be president of the United States.”
Mr. Pence himself appears in the latest 45-page indictment, which notes that he “refused to go along” with Mr. Trump and his allies’ attempts to “fraudulently alter the election results.”
Mr. Pence, who is currently trailing behind Mr. Trump in GOP 2024 presidential race polls, concluded that he wants the American people to know that he will “keep faith with the Constitution” if elected.
“And I do believe that while there has been weaponization at the Justice Department, we certainly lived through it, through the Trump–Pence years, that at the end of the day, history will hold Donald Trump accountable for his reckless words and actions on that day, and I'll always stand by the truth of that and make sure the American people know why I did what I did,” Mr. Pence concluded.
