Mike Pence’s January 6 answer shows why his candidacy is doomed: This week, the former vice president was confronted by a voter who accused him of failing to prevent Joe Biden’s election to the presidency.
His answer, and the response to it, spoke volumes about Pence’s place in the 2024 race.
Why Did Mike Pence Run?
Former Vice President Mike Pence is running for president in 2024 while seeking to keep up a delicate balance: He’s seeking to run both on the accomplishments of the administration he shared with Donald Trump, while also running against Trump, and trying to make the case that he’s a better choice than his former running mate.
Also, Pence has to finesse the issue of January 6, where he went against Trump — and with the consensus of just about every non-fringe constitutional scholar — and did not attempt to block the certification of the electoral votes. This led to the infamous chants of “hang Mike Pence” from the pro-Trump insurrectionists. The pro-Pence Super PAC has even cut an anti-Trump ad that invokes January 6.
Pence is entering a primary where, according to most polls, the majority of Republican voters believe that Trump was the rightful winner of the 2020 presidential election.
This dichotomy, and the doubt it casts on Pence’s chances, was brought into sharp clarity on Wednesday when Pence made a campaign appearance in Iowa.
According to the video from NBC News, Pence was appearing at a pizza restaurant in Iowa, the state where Pence is seeking to follow the history of GOP candidates close to the Christian right who have made strong showings in that early caucus state.
At the event, a woman asked Pence why, on January 6, 2021, he had not agreed to send the electoral votes from certain swing states back to the states.
“If it wasn’t for your vote, we would not have Joe Biden in the White House,” the woman said. “And all those wonderful things that you and Trump were doing together would be continuing, and this country would be on the right path,” she continued.
“Do you ever second-guess yourself? That was a constitutional right that you had to send those votes back to the states,” the woman said. “We all know, by the number of votes that were there, who won that election.”
Mike Pence replied, seemingly as respectfully as he could, that the woman was mistaken.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but that’s actually what the Constitution says,” the former vice president said. “No vice president in American history ever asserted the authority that you have been convinced that I had. But I want to tell you, with all due respect … President Trump was wrong about my authority that day, and he’s still wrong.”
Pence spoke for more than two minutes, about what he described as “an issue that continues to be misunderstood,” and added that “I know with God’s grace that I did exactly what the Constitution of the United States required of me that day, and I kept my oath.”
He added that the elections are held in the states, and it would be wrong for Washington, D.C., let alone one person there, to have the power to overturn all of that. And he said that the time to fight the election results was in the courts, which the Trump-Pence team “did, very aggressively.”
“My job was to oversee the session of Congress, where objections could be heard,” Pence said in Iowa. “but the Constitution says you open and count the votes, no more, no less. The Constitution affords no authority to the vice president or anyone else, to reject votes or return votes to the states.”
He concluded by saying “President Trump was wrong about my authority that day, and he’s still wrong.”
And after Mike Pence finished that answer… it appeared from the video that one person clapped, at an event full of people who had chosen to attend an event for Pence.
That’s an indication that Mike Pence, who had spent more than two minutes accurately describing exactly why he did what he did on that fateful day, is not breaking through to his desired audience.
Expertise and Experience: Stephen Silver is a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive. He is an award-winning journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.
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