In a staggering interview with ABC journalist Jonathan Karl, former President Donald Trump openly defended supporters of his who were at the Capitol during the violence in January and chanted “Hang Mike Pence!” The chant was over Pence’s perceived lack of sufficient loyalty to Trump, who had pressured the then-vice president to intervene in the Congressional certification of the presidential election outcome, which was scheduled for that day — even though vice presidents do not actually possess the legal power to stop the counting of certain electoral votes, as Trump wanted. On CNN, legal analyst Elie Honig suggested that Trump’s defense of the rioters who chanted “Hang Mike Pence!” could provide some of the basis for a criminal charge.
Previously, Trump has already defended the riot crowd as a whole, arguing that what happened at the Capitol constituted a mere “protest” rather than an “insurrection,” as it’s repeatedly been described. To be clear, however, Trump has thereby excused mass physical assaults on police officers, some of whom were gravely injured amid the violence, in addition to the other travesties of the day.
On CNN, Honig commented as follows:
‘Big picture: first of all, this is a Constitutional nightmare. This is a Constitutional worst-case scenario. The utter madness of a president… who is endorsing, supporting these people who are attacking his vice president. Now, to the specific point, what it goes to is the president’s intent, and this is what investigators in Congress need to be thinking about and in the Justice Department… Defenders of the president said, well, what he meant is go down there and picket and carry signs and exercise political speech. However, this shows that… when they were in there breaking windows and attacking the vice president, they were doing exactly what Donald Trump wanted, and hoped, and intended, and that issue of intent should be at the heart of any Congressional inquiry, or any prosecutorial inquiry.’
The House committee investigating the Capitol riot certainly appears to be operating under similar principles. Throughout recent days, the panel has subpoenaed 16 individuals with ties to Trump, and that list includes certain high-profile names, like ex-Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn and ex-Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany. On CNN, Honig added as follows:
‘It is vital that we know what Donald Trump was doing during the attack on January 6. That will tell the story. All the spin in the world doesn’t matter; if he was there cheering them on… supporting them, like we just heard in that tape, that’s obviously a violation of his Constitutional duty, and I argue that’s criminal as well.’
Check out Honig’s remarks below:
