WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Donald Trump\u2019s defense attorney says the former president never asked\u00a0Mike Pence\u00a0to overturn the will of the voters in the 2020 election, but only wanted the former vice president to \u201cpause\u201d the certification of votes to allow states to investigate his claims of election fraud. Those baseless claims had already been rejected by numerous courts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking on several Sunday morning news shows, Trump attorney\u00a0John Lauro\u00a0said Trump was within his First Amendment rights when he petitioned Pence to delay the certification on Jan. 6, 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe ultimate ask of Vice President Pence was to pause the counts and allow the states to weigh in,\u201d Lauro said on CBS\u2019 \u201cFace the Nation.\u201d He added that Trump was convinced there were irregularities in the election that needed to be investigated by state authorities before the election could be certified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pence, who like Trump is\u00a0seeking the Republican nomination for president in 2024, flatly rejected that account during an interview Sunday, saying Trump seemed \u201cconvinced\u201d as early as December that Pence had the right to reject or return votes and that on Jan. 5, Trump\u2019s attorneys told him \u201c\u2018We want you to reject votes outright.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey were asking me to overturn the election. I had no right to overturn the election,\u201d Pence said on CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pence\u2019s role in certifying Joe Biden\u2019s win over Trump in the 2020 election makes him a central figure in the prosecution against Trump on charges that he sought to overturn the will of the voters and remain in office even after the courts had\u00a0roundly rejected\u00a0his claims of electoral fraud. Federal and state election officials and Trump\u2019s own attorney general also had said there were was no credible evidence the election was tainted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Last week\u2019s indictment chronicles how Trump and his allies, in what special counsel Jack Smith described as an attack on a \u201cbedrock function of the U.S. government,\u201d repeatedly lied about the results in the two months after he lost the election and pressured Pence and state election officials to take action to help him cling to power. Those efforts culminated on Jan. 6, 2021, when Trump supporters violently stormed the Capitol in an effort to stop the certification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump pleaded not guilty\u00a0to those charges. Separately, he also faces charges that he\u00a0falsified business records\u00a0relating to hush money payments to a porn actor in New York and\u00a0improperly kept classified documents\u00a0at his Palm Beach, Florida, resort and obstructed an investigation into their handling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week with George Stephanopoulos,\u201d Lauro said Pence\u2019s testimony will show Trump believed the election was rigged and that he was listening to the advice of his attorneys when he sought to delay the certification. Pence, who appeared before the grand jury that indicted Trump, said he will comply with the law if asked to testify.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI cannot wait until I have the opportunity to cross examine Mr. Pence,\u201d Lauro said. \u201cHe will completely eliminate any doubt that President Trump firmly believed that the election irregularities had led to an inappropriate result.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The 45-page indictment details how people close to Trump repeatedly told him he had lost and that there was no truth to his claims of fraud. In one encounter days before the riot, Trump told Pence he was\u00a0\u201ctoo honest\u201d\u00a0after the vice president said he didn\u2019t have the authority to reject electoral votes, the indictment says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Former allies of Trump have said Trump knew he lost but spread false claims about fraud anyway. After he failed to convince state officials to illegally swing the election, Trump and his allies recruited\u00a0fake electors in swing states\u00a0to sign certificates falsely stating Trump had prevailed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHe knew well that he had lost the election,\u201d Trump\u2019s former Attorney General Bill Barr told CNN last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lauro said Trump\u2019s defense team will seek to move the case from Washington because it wants a more diverse jury. He said he would support televising the trial, and dismissed speculation that it could wrap up before the 2024 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn 40 years of practicing law, on a case of this magnitude, I\u2019ve not known a single case to go to trial before two to three years,\u201d Lauro said on CBS\u2019 \u201cFace the Nation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Responding to questions about whether Trump can get a fair trial in the nation\u2019s capital, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a former federal prosecutor and a Republican, said he can.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYes, I believe jurors can be fair. I believe in the American people,\u201d Christie said Sunday on CNN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A slew of people charged in the Jan. 6 riot have tried to get their trials moved out of Washington. Yet judges have\u00a0rejected those motions\u00a0in every case, saying fair jurors can be found with proper questioning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump\u2019s legal team has until 5 p.m. Monday to respond to the\u00a0prosecution\u2019s request for a protective order\u00a0limiting Trump\u2019s ability to publicly disclose information about the case. The decision is up to U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Protective orders are common in criminal cases, but prosecutors said it\u2019s \u201cparticularly important in this case\u201d because Trump has posted on social media about \u201cwitnesses, judges, attorneys, and others associated with legal matters pending against him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Prosecutors pointed specifically to a post on Trump\u2019s Truth Social platform from Friday in which Trump wrote, in all capital letters, \u201cIf you go after me, I\u2019m coming after you!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Donald Trump\u2019s defense attorney says […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2697,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2696"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2698,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696\/revisions\/2698"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}