Pence on being asked to overturn 2020 election: ‘President Trump was wrong then and he’s wrong now’

by Lauren Sforza - 08/06/23 8:24 AM ET

Greg Nash
Republican presidential candidate Mike Pence addresses the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority conference in Washington, D.C., on Friday, June 23, 2023.

Former Vice President Mike Pence said that former President Trump’s claims that the vice president had the power to overturn the 2020 election was “wrong.”

“President Trump was wrong then and he’s wrong now,” Pence told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union.” “I had no right to overturn the election. Very clear that under the Constitution of the United States, Article Two, my responsibility as vice president, as president of the Senate, was to preside over a joint session of Congress where the Constitution says the electoral votes shall be opened and shall be counted.”

Pence — who is running for president — has maintained that as vice president, he had no authority to overturn the 2020 election. In the CNN interview, which aired Sunday, he reiterated that he believes the Constitution is “more important than any one man.”

“I truly do believe that we kept our oath to the Constitution that day,” Pence said. “But the American people deserve to know that President Trump, you know, asked me to put him over my oath to the Constitution, but I kept my oath, and I always will.”

“And I’m running for president in part because I think anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be president of the United States,” he added.

Pence condemned the former president shortly after he was indicted last week on four criminal charges related to his efforts to cling to power and overturn the results of the 2020 election. The indictment itself reveals how Trump allegedly attempted to use Pence to help keep him in office, with it stating that Trump “directly pressured the Vice President to use his ceremonial role at the certification proceeding on January 6 to fraudulently overturn the results of the election, and the Vice President resisted.”

“Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” Pence wrote in a statement after Trump was indicted.

Pence also said Sunday that he has no plans to testify against Trump at a trial, although he appeared before the federal grand jury in the case in April, after previously challenging a subpoena from special counsel Jack Smith.