Pence ratted out Trump big time. He kept contemporaneous notes of everything that happened leading up to the attempted coup— and he shared them with Jack Smith. His fingerprints are all over those indictments. And if I were him, I’d have some real good 24-7 security… which he’s probably had for years anyway. (Secret Service protection for vice presidents is nothing like the 10 years presidents get. Protection for former vice presidents falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security and the Secret Service. According to Title 18, Section 3056, former vice presidents are eligible for protection by the Secret Service for up to six months after they leave office. During this six-month period, the Secret Service provides security details to the former vice president and their immediate family members. After the six months have elapsed, the Secret Service protection is no longer mandatory but the DHS may still authorize continued protection on a case-by-case basis if deemed necessary for the individual's security and safety. I would imagine Pence’s situation would have been deemed super-necessary.)
Yesterday people were buzzing about a litmus test regarding how the other presidential candidates would have handled the pressure Trump was putting on Pence to illegally overturn the election. It would be amazing if a moderator of one of the debates ws independent enough to ask every candidate what he or she would have done in Pence’s situation.
Wednesday afternoon Shane Goldmacher and Maggie Astor reported that Pence is accepting— somewhat reluctantly— his fate as an anti-Trump candidate. “‘Anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be president of the United States,” he said. Pence has repeatedly suggested that Trump’s campaign to overturn the vote is disqualifying. But he has not said exactly how far he will go to prevent a second Trump turn in the White House, and whether those efforts would include testifying in court as a key witness for the prosecution.”
Pence is involved in some of the most vivid scenes detailed in the indictment from the special counsel, Jack Smith, charging Trump with a conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstructing an official proceeding— the certification of the 2020 election.
At the very center were Trump’s efforts to pressure Pence to stop Biden from being certified as the winner in the Electoral College on Jan. 6, 2021. Pence had a ceremonial role that day, and Trump pushed him to exploit it to stay in power.
The pressure included a Christmas Day phone call, according to the indictment, in which Pence, an evangelical Christian, called Trump to say “Merry Christmas.” The president used the call as an opening to ask him to reject the electoral vote. Pence pushed back: “You know I don’t think I have the authority to change the outcome,” he said, according to the indictment.
They spoke again on New Year’s Day, when Pence again said that he had no constitutional authority to stop Biden’s ascent and that the effort was “improper,” according to the indictment.
“You’re too honest,” Trump told him.
Pence met with federal prosecutors this year and appears to have cooperated with them by describing the discussions he had with Trump between the election and Jan. 6. He has not said whether he would appear in court to testify against Trump, who made him a national figure when he selected Pence, then Indiana’s governor, as his running mate.
For months, Pence has maintained that “history will hold Donald Trump accountable” for his actions on Jan. 6. But he has avoided saying if the justice system should.
After repeating on Tuesday that Trump should never again be president, Pence added that he had not yet “reviewed” the indictment and reserved further comment for when he had. The rest of his statement mostly echoed what he has said before— with one notable omission. He did not condemn the charges, after saying as recently as 10 days ago that he “really” hoped none would come.
If the statement was a master class in political needle-threading, perhaps no politician has had a narrower needle to thread than Pence.
He spent more than four years as Trump’s running mate and then vice president, a period in which he was so loyal that a prominent vice-presidential historian called him the “sycophant in chief.” But then he defied Trump’s biggest demand, that he overturn the 2020 election in violation of the Constitution. Pence is still cautious when criticizing a man who retains the intense loyalty of the party’s base, but he also wants to beat him for the Republican nomination.
His own communications and actions are a crucial part of the evidence cited in the indictment. And notably, the indictment centers on an event— the storming of the Capitol— in which Trump supporters threatened Pence’s life.
Pence has previously dismissed the Trump-backed effort to thwart the will of the voters in January 2021 as “ bad advice of a group of crank lawyers.” In a CNN interview on July 23— after the Justice Department sent Trump a target letter indicating that he was likely to be indicted in the election case, but before the indictment actually arrived— Pence said he “really” hoped the department would not file charges.
Pence is getting to closer to war with Trump click on this tweet to hear what he said-- on Fox no less-- about Trump's criminal behavior.
"It would be amazing if a moderator of one of the debates ws independent enough to ask every candidate what he or she would have done in Pence’s situation." Not really, it's easy to sidestep. "I would never put the interests of myself or any one man above the interests of the American people. I will always do what is best for the country as I see it." A better question would be "In light of the Jan. 6 insurrection, what changes should be made to the electoral system to insure it's integrity against manipulation or intervention from foreign or domestic special interests?" or "Does the power of Presidential Pardon give the President too much power and incentive to commit illegal acts,…
is i t really up to Pence whether he serves as a witness at the trial? Huh. let’s hear from Andrew Weissmann about this!