WASHINGTON, Oct 4: Days before rioters roamed the halls of the US Capitol threatening to “hang Mike Pence,” Donald Trump told his vice president that people are going to “hate your guts” and “think you’re stupid” if he failed to stop the 2020 election certification.
The New Year’s Day warning wasn’t the first time Trump pressured Pence to overturn the election results. Nor was it the last. In what came to be known as “Operation Pence Card,” Trump spent weeks publicly and privately pushing his vice president to help him stay in power after losing.
“You’re too honest,” Trump berated his vice president in that Jan. 1 morning call.
After they hung up, the president tweeted a reminder for his followers to come to Washington for the “BIG Protest Rally” just days away — what would become the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol.
The exchanges between the president and his vice president, detailed in special counsel Jack Smith’s court filing this week, show the extraordinary lengths Trump went to overturn the 2020 election, even as he lays the groundwork to challenge this year’s contest, if he loses.
Pence is no longer standing beside Trump, and has refused to endorse the Republican nominee’s bid to return to the White House. Trump and his new vice presidential running mate, JD Vance, still refuse to accept the 2020 election results that delivered the presidency to Joe Biden.
Much of the special counsel’s filing recounts the tumultuous months after the November election, when Trump — surrounded by allies including Steve Bannon, his former campaign manager turned podcast host, who is now in jail after a contempt of Congress conviction — directed his team to fight to keep him in office. The former president, indicted on criminal charges in the conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election, called the new filing “election interference” and has sought to have the case dismissed. (AP)
