Staff Reports
McClintock spoke just hours before the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol held its third public hearing, which was expected to focus on Pence’s role and Trump’s efforts to pressure him.
At a rally in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021, President Donald Trump urged Vice President Mike Pence to reject the Electoral College results from many states whose results were disputed, sending the vote back to state legislatures for re-consideration.
While the vast majority of those who attended Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally were calm, a small minority of protesters began rioting at the Capitol before Trump had finished speaking a mile away. The “insurrection” is being investigated by the January 6 Committee.
The Capitol riot, which McClintock described as an attempt to halt the democratic process, raised severe concerns, according to McClintock. However, he claimed that the current “Soviet-style show trial that’s going on right now.” could not address these.
He pointed out that the January 6 Committee, which held its first public hearings last week, was solely appointed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) after Republican nominees were rejected for the first time in history.
When asked if Vice President Pence was correct in rejecting Trump and his supporters’ request that he not certify the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, McClintock said Pence had acted appropriately and within the Constitution.
McClintock said that the idea that Congress could simply take over the adjudication of a presidential election after an Electoral College majority was “extremely dangerous” and “nonsensical,” and that it might be used to overturn any election outcome.
Trump allies, such as former economic adviser Peter Navarro, have faulted Pence for obstructing what they claim was a legally valid process to review election results in areas where voting laws had been modified unconstitutionally.
When asked last year who persuaded him to certify the results of the 2020 election instead of carrying out an alleged plan to change the outcome, Pence responded bluntly: “James Madison,” the creator of much of the Constitution.
The preceding is a summary of an article that originally appeared on Breit Bart.
