“If there was an invitation to participate, I would consider it,” Pence said, after calling Jan. 6 a tragic day for all Americans. “But, you heard me mention the Constitution a few times this morning. Under the Constitution, we have three co-equal branches of government, and any invitation to me, I would have to consider the unique role I served as vice president. It would be unprecedented in history for a vice president to be called to testify on Capitol Hill. But, as I said, I don’t want to prejudge, so if there is ever an official invitation to us, we would give it due consideration.” They include President Gerald Ford, who voluntarily testified before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Criminal Justice in 1974 to explain why he pardoned his predecessor Richard Nixon.
Trump’s pressure campaign against Pence
The Jan. 6 panel laid out in a public hearing in June how former President Donald Trump tried to pressure Pence, his vice president, to join his plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election — and how Pence’s refusal set the his life in danger as the rioters called for his hanging on January 6, 2021. Two witnesses who advised Pence that he did not have the authority to overturn the election testified during the June 16 hearing: Pence’s former lawyer Greg Jacobs and retired Republican judge J. Michael Luttig. The panel investigated how Trump’s conservative lawyer John Eastman proposed a legal theory that Pence could unilaterally block the certification of the election — a theory rejected by Trump’s White House lawyers and Pence’s team, but nonetheless embraced by the former President. In a videotaped deposition played June 16, Marc Short, Pence’s chief of staff, said the vice president advised Trump “multiple times” that he did not have the legal or constitutional authority to overturn results while presiding over the joint session. of Congress on January 6 to count the electoral votes. On Wednesday, Pence also repeated his call for U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to give the American people a full account of why the recent investigation into Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort was necessary, citing FBI politicization against during the Trump administration. “This unprecedented action requires unprecedented transparency,” Pence said, while continuing to defend the officials. “I just want to remind my fellow Republicans, we can hold the AG accountable for the decision she made without attacking law enforcement personnel at the FBI. The Republican Party is the party of law and order. Our party stands for men and the women who serve on the thin blue line at the federal, state and local levels, and these attacks on the FBI must stop. Calls for FBI payback are just as wrong as calls for police payback.” Pence spoke in front of a packed room, with about a dozen people standing along the walls. As he has done in recent speeches, he argued that elections are about the future, not the past, and that the GOP must offer a positive vision of the future to win. This was the latest of several trips Pence has made to states with early presidential contests. New Hampshire is holding the nation’s first primary, a key contest in the race for the White House. After the speech, he was to spend the day campaigning with state Senate candidates and participating in roundtable discussions with business leaders and law enforcement officials before giving a keynote speech at a Tri-County GOP event. This story has been updated. CNN’s Annie Grayer and Rachel Janfaza contributed to this report.
