Former President Donald Trump blamed former Vice President Mike Pence for the 2021 Capitol riot when a mob of Trump supporters stormed the building to try to overturn the 2020 election.
In the days and weeks leading up to Congress’s certification of the results on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump claimed that as the presiding officer, Pence had the authority to reject results from states he lost and send the matter to the state legislatures to be resolved. Trump falsely claimed the election had been rigged against him and proposed this scheme as the way to remedy it.
Speaking to reporters aboard his plane on Monday while heading to a rally in Iowa, Trump blamed Pence for the violence.
Had he sent the votes back to the legislatures, they wouldn’t have had a problem with Jan. 6, so in many ways you can blame him for Jan. 6,” Trump said, according to the Washington Post. “Had he sent them back to Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, the states, I believe, number one, you have had a different outcome. But I also believe you wouldn’t have had ‘Jan. 6’ as we call it.”
Pence has repeatedly noted he did not have the constitutional authority to act as Trump wanted. When he declined to attempt anything of the sort on Jan. 6, Trump supporters stormed the Capitol. Some of them chanted, “Hang Mike Pence!” as a gallows stood outside the building
At an event in Washington, D.C. over the weekend, Pence slammed Trump for the Capitol riot.
“I know that history will hold Donald Trump accountable,” he said.
