Donald Trump appeared to undermine his claim that he did not deliberately seek to overturn the results of the 2020 election while speaking during a campaign rally in 2021.
The former president and frontrunner in the GOP primaries is facing a federal indictment brought by special counsel Jack Smith in August 2023 over allegedly plotting to stay in power after losing the election, despite knowing he had fairly lost to Joe Biden. He has denied all wrongdoing.
Trump is also accused of trying to pressure former Vice President Mike Pence to stop the certification of the election results by either convincing him to accept the fake electors’ false assessment that Trump had won in seven states, or by trying to get Pence to send legitimate electoral votes to state legislatures for review, rather than counting them.
Pence has corroborated this report, saying on CNN in August: “They were asking me to overturn the election. I had no right to overturn the election.”
Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Trump’s defense attorney has said, however, that the former president didn’t ask Pence to overturn the will of the electorate in the 2020 election, but only wanted the former vice president to “pause” the certification of votes to allow states to investigate his claims of election fraud.
“The ultimate ask of Vice President Pence was to pause the counts and allow the states to weigh in,” attorney John Lauro said on CBS in August. He added that Trump was acting upon his right to free speech and that he truly believed there were problems in the election that needed to be investigated.
But speaking at a “Save America” rally in Washington, D.C., on January 6, 2021, before Congress confirmed the election results, Trump appeared to counter that defense, saying he believed Pence had “the absolute right” to “protect our constitution.”
“I hope Mike is going to do the right thing,” he said. “I hope so. I hope so because if Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election. All he has to do. This is from the number one or certainly one of the top constitutional lawyers in our country. He has the absolute right to do it. We’re supposed to protect our country, support our country, support our constitution, and protect our constitution.”
Newsweek has contacted representatives for Trump and Pence by email to comment on this story.
Trump’s trial is set for March 2024. He is also facing an indictment in Georgia over allegedly attempting to overturn the state’s election results, as well as two other criminal indictments, one pertaining to his alleged mishandling of classified documents and the other regarding falsifying business records concerning hush money payments paid to adult actress Stormy Daniels.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.