A day after the House of Representatives committee investigating the January 6 attack illustrated the serious danger the rebels posed to Mike Pence, former President Donald J. Trump has launched a new attack on the man who served as his vice president, criticizing him for refusing to interfere with the certification of the Electoral College in the 2020 presidential election.
Speaking to a religious group on Friday afternoon, Mr Trump said “Mike did not have the courage to act” in an attempt to unilaterally reject the Electoral College’s vote for Joseph R. Biden Jr.
On Thursday, a House of Representatives committee demonstrated that Mr Trump and his advisers had been told repeatedly that Mr Pence had no power to block certification and that it would break the law, but he was pressured to try anyway.
The commission is also using witnesses to dismantle and debunk Mr Trump’s false allegations of widespread election fraud, arguments he reiterated in his keynote address at the Coalition for Faith and Freedom conference in Nashville on Friday.
Mr Trump was angry as he watched the hearings, knowing he lacked a hooligan pulpit to respond to, according to his advisers. He used much of his address on Friday to repeat his false election allegations and denigrate Mr Pence.
The topics of the hearings of the committee of the House of Representatives on January 6
Most striking was the context of the attack on Mr Pence, whose presence on the 2016 presidential ticket was crucial to reassuring evangelical voters that Mr Trump, a three-time married real estate developer in New York, whose the first divorce was fodder for the tabloids for months, and those who supported abortion rights had become conservative enough on social issues.
Mr. Pence, who often talks about his religious faith, is a favorite among voters attending the conference. But that did not stop Mr Trump from exposing him from the scene on Friday.
After repeating allegations of election fraud that were widely debunked, including by his former Attorney General William P. Barr, Mr Trump turned his attention to Mr Pence.
First, he insisted that he had not called Mr. Pence “weak” in a telephone conversation with the vice president on the morning of January 6, 2021, even though former Trump aide Nick Luna testified under penalty of perjury for such a comment. “I don’t even know who these people are,” Mr Trump told the crowd.
“I never called Mike Pence a fool,” said Mr Trump, whose daughter Ivanka was present at the interview, and later told his chief of staff that Mr Trump had in fact called Mr Pence a coward using vulgarity. Mr Trump then went on to describe Mr Pence as weak.
“Mike Pence had a chance to be great. He had a chance to be, frankly, historic, “said the former president. “But just like Bill Bar and the rest of these weak people,” he said, “Mr. Pence did not have the courage to act.” The comment was met with applause.
Mr Trump continued to mock Mr Pence, whose aides testified that he had repeatedly told Mr Trump that he had no power to reject Mr Biden’s victory in the Electoral College or to declare a 10-day break. in a session of Congress to send the vote back to the states to be reconsidered.
“Mike Pence had absolutely no choice but to be a human conveyor belt,” Mr Trump said.
Mr Trump also mischaracterized the certification of Thomas Jefferson’s 1801 presidential victory – a process Jefferson, then vice-president – oversaw – to argue that Mr Pence should have used that model to keep Mr. Mr. Trump in office.
“I told Mike, ‘If you do that, you can be Thomas Jefferson,'” Mr Trump said. “And when it all fell apart, one day I looked at him and said, ‘Mike, I hate to say this, but you’re not Thomas Jefferson.’
Mark Short, Mr Pence’s former chief of staff, said the conversation never happened. Mr Short did not comment further on Mr Trump’s speech.
Mr Trump also complained that the House of Representatives committee had edited videos of his former associates’ testimonies so that they would not be released in full context. He appears to be referring indirectly to the testimony of his daughter Ivanka, whose remarks were used against her father in two hearings.
Speaking about the crowd that left his speech on the Ellipse on January 6 and stormed the Capitol, Mr. Trump remained defensive. “It was just a protest,” he said. “It got out of hand.”
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