Pence plan to reject electors ‘crazy’
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump’s closest advisers viewed his last-ditch efforts to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to reject the tally of state electors and overturn the 2020 election as “nuts,” “crazy” and even likely incite riots, witnesses revealed in stark testimony to the Jan. 6 committee Thursday.
Gripping new evidence also detailed how the mob that stormed the Capitol that day came within 40 feet of where Pence and his team were sheltering, highlighting the danger Trump had put him in.
With live testimony, including from Pence’s counsel, and other evidence from its yearlong investigation the panel is dissecting as unlawful and unconstitutional the plan from conservative lawyer John Eastman to reverse Joe Biden’s election victory.
The pressure Trump put on Pence, including at a Jan. 6 rally, led directly to the insurrection at the Capitol, the panel said.
“Are you out of your effing mind?” said Eric Herschmann, a lawyer advising Trump, told Eastman in recorded testimony shown at the hearing.
“You’re going to turn around and tell 78-plus million people in this country that your theory is this is how you’re going to invalidate their votes?” Herschmann said.
He warned: “You’re going to cause riots in the streets.”
A text message from Fox News’ Sean Hannity to Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows about the plan in the run-up to Jan. 6 read: “I’m very worried about the next 48 hours.”
Trump campaign adviser Jason Miller said those around Trump called it “crazy.”
The panel opened its third hearing this month demonstrating that Trump’s false claims of a fraudulent election left him grasping for alternatives as courts turned back dozens of lawsuits challenging the vote.
Trump latched onto Eastman’s highly unusual plan to defy historical precedent of the Electoral Count Act, and started pressuring Pence in public and private as the vice president was to preside over the Jan. 6 joint session of Congress to certify Biden’s election.
The committee has said the plan was illegal, and a federal judge has said it is “more likely than not” Trump committed crimes in his attempt to stop the certification
Panel Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., opened the latest hearing citing Pence’s own words that there was “almost no idea more un-American” than the one he was being asked to perform — reject the vote.
By refusing Trump’s demands, Pence “did his duty,” said the panel’s vice-chair, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming.
Thompson said, “Our democracy came dangerously close to catastrophe.”
The committee portrayed the gripping, if complicated, final days before the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection as the defeated Trump pursued the theory that Pence could swing the election, putting his own vice president in danger as the mob headed toward the Capitol.
The panel heard from Greg Jacob, the vice president’s counsel who fended off Eastman’s ideas for Pence to carry out the plan, and retired federal judge Michael Luttig, who called the plan from Eastman, his former law clerk, “incorrect at every turn.”
Jacob said that Pence summoned him to his West Wing office in early December 2020 to seek clarity about the vice president’s role in the certification of election results. He said it became clear to Pence that the founding fathers did not intend to empower any one person, including someone running for office, to affect the election result. Pence “never budged,” from that initial view, Jacob said.