Former Vice President Mike Pence, who huddled in the bowels of the U.S. Capitol on Jan 6, 2021 as angry Trump supporters searched for him, tells “Meet the Press” that “no one is above the law” when asked about former President Donald Trump.
But the former vice president, who Trump publicly blamed for not halting a peaceful transfer of power, also warned the Biden administration about over-reaching in their attempts to hold Trump to account.
“I don’t know if it is criminal to listen to bad advice from the lawyers,” Pence told “Meet the Press” Moderator Chuck Todd in an interview on Thursday. Pence said, “the [former] president was repeating … what he was hearing from that gaggle of attorneys around him.”
And, he said that as president, “you have to rely on your team, and you have to rely on the credibility of the people around you.”
Pence said Trump’s lawyers falsely advised him that the former vice president had the authority to overturn the 2020 election results, calling the advice “demonstrably and historically false.”
Pivoting from Trump’s embrace of “false” legal advice before the January 6th attack, Pence focused blame on Attorney General Merrick Garland and Justice Department leadership for executing an investigation into Trump and authorizing a search of the former president’s Mar-A-Lago residence and seizing classified documents in an unprotected area.
“No one is above the law. But I would hope the Justice Department would give careful consideration before they take any additional steps in this matter,” Pence said.
“This is really a time when our country ought to be healing, and frankly, the Justice Department’s actions have been exposed from during our administration where FBI agents were advancing political agendas,” he added.
Pence says he has not hesitated to criticize the former president when he thinks he was wrong, though stops short of calling him unfit for office.
Watch the full interview Sunday on "Meet the Press with Chuck Todd."
