Former President Donald Trump once called his vice president a “wimp” and the “p-word” for refusing to block Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s presidential victory.
Now Mike Pence has turned against Mr. Trump and become a star witness in a federal criminal trial that could land the ex-president in jail for decades.
Special counsel Jack Smith’s four-count indictment of Mr. Trump on charges he undertook a “criminal scheme” to remain in office despite losing the election, features a set of contemporaneous notes taken by Mr. Pence, which the former vice president dutifully handed over to federal prosecutors.
The notes detailed private phone calls and other conversations he held with Mr. Trump in late 2020 and early 2021 when Mr. Trump was questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election results and looking for ways to overturn them.
According to Mr. Smith, Mr. Pence’s notes and testimony he provided earlier this year to a grand jury show Mr. Trump “repeated knowingly false claims of election fraud and 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.”
Mr. Pence has publicly criticized Mr. Trump over his actions leading up to the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Now a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, Mr. Pence is poised to become a historic star witness if the case goes to trial in a Washington courtroom.
The four counts accuse Mr. Trump of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstructing an official proceeding, and conspiracy against the rights of citizens, a charge that was once used to prosecute members of the Ku Klux Klan.
Mr. Pence’s testimony at trial could help put Mr. Trump, 77, in prison for four decades if he’s convicted on all charges.
“If he’s subpoenaed, he has to testify unless a privilege applies, like the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent or the executive privilege,” former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told The Washington Times. “I don’t think either applies.”
Legal defense experts question whether Mr. Pence’s testimony could help convict Mr. Trump.
Former Harvard Law Professor and famed defense attorney Alan Dershowitz said the value of Mr. Pence for prosecutors hinges on what he says if he ends up on the witness stand and whether he can show Mr. Trump actually believed Mr. Biden was the winner.
“If he swears that Trump admitted that he lost fair and square, that would be compelling,” Mr. Dershowitz told The Washington Times. “I doubt that’s true.”
The indictment features pages of Mr. Pence’s eyewitness account of Mr. Trump’s actions and their conversations following the election, including several times in which Mr. Pence told Mr. Trump he had no power to block Mr. Biden’s electoral victory in Congress.
Mr. Pence provided an account of a Christmas Day phone call to the president in which Mr. Trump “quickly turned the conversation to January 6 and his request that the vice president reject electoral votes that day.”
According to Mr. Smith, Pence “pushed back” and told Mr. Trump, “You know I don’t think I have the authority to change the outcome.”
The duo’s interactions culminated in a heated phone call after Mr. Pence defied Mr. Trump on Jan. 6 and refused to block Congress from certifying Mr. Biden’s victory.
Mr. Trump’s aides who witnessed the call were subpoenaed to testify before a congressional committee examining the Jan. 6 riot. The aides said they heard the president, while on the phone with Mr. Pence, calling him a “wimp” and a “pussy.”
When pro-Trump rioters began attacking the Capitol later that afternoon, Mr. Trump tweeted: “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done.”
Mr. Pence has criticized Mr. Trump over his actions leading up to and during the Jan. 6 riot, calling the tweet “reckless” and asserting he had no authority to reject the certification of Biden’s victory.
Since leaving office, Mr. Trump has periodically attacked his former running mate at rallies and public events, telling a crowd in Nashville last year that Mr. Pence “did not have the courage to act” on Jan. 6.
Now struggling to gain traction in the polls, Mr. Pence is striking back. He fired a broadside against Mr. Trump shortly after Mr. Smith released the indictment.
“Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” Pence said in a statement.
Mr. Pence appeared on Fox News on Wednesday to defend his criticism of Mr. Trump and the evidence he supplied to Mr. Smith. Mr. Trump, who may or may not have been watching, took to his social media site to lob a lengthy insult at his former running mate, even as Mr. Pence may soon be testifying against him in court.
“I feel badly for Mike Pence, who is attracting no crowds, enthusiasm, or loyalty from people who, as a member of the Trump Administration, should be loving him. He didn’t fight against Election Fraud, which we will now be easily able to prove based on the most recent Fake Indictment & information which will have to be made available to us, finally — a really BIG deal. The V.P. had power that Mike didn’t understand, but after the Election, the RINOS & Dems changed the law, taking that power away!”
Trump pollster John McLaughlin told The Times that Mr. Pence is unlikely to pick up significant new support now that he’s positioned himself as a leading witness against the former president.
“Pence is going nowhere, and the Never Trump lane is extremely small in the GOP primary,” Mr. McLaughlin said. “In our latest national survey, Trump has 87% approval with all Republicans and a 93% approval among conservative Republicans, that’s why he’s their guy.”
Nationally, Mr. Pence garners about 4% in polls and does not register among the top four candidates in the critical early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire.
If he testifies against the former president, Mr. Pence’s contradictory statements could be used against him, including a speech he delivered in Georgia on Jan. 4, 2021, in which he told the crowd, “I know we’ve all got doubts about the election. I share the concerns of millions of Americans about voting irregularities. I promise you this Wednesday we’ll have our day in Congress. We’ll hear the objections. We’ll hear the evidence.”
Mr. Pence also told CNN earlier this year he’s “not yet convinced” Mr. Trump broke the law with his actions following the election.
But it’s clear Mr. Smith considers him a top witness in his criminal case against Mr. Trump, who will be arraigned Thursday in Washington.
Mr. Smith took the unusual step of sitting in on Mr. Pence’s five-hour testimony before a grand jury earlier this year and dedicated a significant portion of the 45-page indictment to Mr. Pence’s notes and recollections.
Mike Davis, a legal expert and former Supreme Court law clerk, said that he believes Mr. Smith’s strategy will backfire with voters.
“It’s transparently political to try to divide and conquer the Republican Party,” Mr. Davis said. “This is not going to fly with the American people. The American people are not going to let a D.C. prosecutor and a D.C. judge and a D.C. jury decide who’s the president of the United States.”
