Trump Blasts Mike Pence for Failing to ‘Overturn the Election’
'Pence did have the right to change the outcome'
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President Donald Trump has blasted Mike Pence for failing to overturn the 2020 election results.
Trump’s remarks come in a statement released by his Save America PAC, which commented on a bipartisan effort in the Senate to update the 1887 law that outlines the vice president’s role in overseeing Congress certifying the election results.
Trump also singled out Sen. Susan Collins, who is spearheading the group, and said she wouldn’t rule out supporting Trump in 2024 if he runs for the White House again.
Collins also claimed it was “not likely” in the expectation that there would be other “qualified” candidates.
“If the Vice President (Mike Pence) had ‘absolutely no right’ to change the Presidential Election results in the Senate, despite fraud and many other irregularities, how come the Democrats and RINO Republicans, like Wacky Susan Collins, are desperately trying to pass legislation that will not allow the Vice President to change the results of the election?” Trump said.
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“Actually, what they are saying, is that Mike Pence did have the right to change the outcome, and they now want to take that right away,” Trump argued.
“Unfortunately, he didn’t exercise that power, he could have overturned the Election!” he added with emphasis.
Pence resisted pressure to stall the Jan. 6, 2021, Electoral College vote count, sending a letter to Congress saying that he did not have the power to reject Electoral College votes.
Trump said in December Pence was a “good man” who made a “big mistake.”
“He could have overturned the election.” This is an admission, and a massively un-American statement. It is time for every Republican leader to pick a side… Trump or the Constitution, there is no middle on defending our nation anymore. pic.twitter.com/Bp3dfn7cBe
— Adam Kinzinger (@AdamKinzinger) January 31, 2022
Former Trump White House adviser Peter Navarro worked with Steve Bannon to implement a plan called “Green Bay Sweep,” aimed at enlisting members of Congress and putting pressure on Pence to stall the Jan. 6 certification and send electoral votes back to several battleground states.
Navarro said rioters who swarmed the Capitol disrupted the counting of electoral votes, messed up the plan.
Vocal Trump critic George Conway shot back with an “answer” to the 45th president’s statement, saying a bid to overturn the results was never possible.
“The Twelfth Amendment and the Electoral Count Act of 1887 already make it entirely clear that the Vice President merely opens the envelopes,” Conway said.
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“But sometimes we want to make laws even clearer so that even semiliterate psychopaths have a chance at understanding them,” Conway added.
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said on Twitter that “Pence is speaking the night before Trump in NOLA at the Rnc.”
She also tweeted:
“Trump saying the quiet part out loud here about overturning an election,” and, “First the claim was that Pence could change the outcome, then it became that it was just about sending the election ‘back to the states.’ Now it’s back to overturning it again.”
Trump has since hinted at pardons for people arrested and charged in connection to the Capitol riot, another hint at a 2024 run.
“We will treat those people from Jan. 6 fairly,” Trump said.
“We will treat them fairly. And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons, because they are being treated so unfairly. This hasn’t happened to all of the other atrocities that took place recently,” Trump said.
“Nothing like this has happened.
"What that ‘unselect’ committee is doing and what the people are doing that are running those prisons, it’s a disgrace,” he added.
“It’s a disgrace. We will treat them fairly, and we will take care of the people of this country.
"All of the people of this country.”
Pence said that Jan. 6, 2021, was “a tragic day in the life of the nation” and defended his actions.
“I know I did my duty under the constitution of the United States,” Pence said.
“But the president and I sat down in the days that followed that.
"We spoke about it, talked through it.
"We parted amicably.”
