Politics

Pence: Trump wrong to claim VP can overturn presidential election result

Miami, Feb 4 (EFE).- Mike Pence on Friday rejected the idea that as vice president he had the power to overturn the outcome of the November 2020 election during a special joint session of Congress.

Responding to the repeated claims of his erstwhile boss, most recently in a statement last weekend, Pence said ex-President Donald Trump “is wrong” and that the “presidency belongs to the American people and the American people alone.”

Pence, who like Trump is believed to be gearing up for a presidential run in 2024, made his remarks during the The Federalist Society’s eighth annual Florida Chapters Conference in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, an event that the former governor of Indiana said was a gathering of “constitutional conservatives.”

“I heard this week President Trump said I had the right to ‘overturn the election.’ President Trump is wrong. I had no right to overturn the election,” he said. “And frankly there is almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president.”

Pence made his remarks after Trump reiterated Sunday in a statement released by his Save America PAC that his then-vice president had the power to alter the outcome.

“If the Vice President (Mike Pence) had ‘absolutely no right’ to change the presidential election results in the Senate, despite fraud and many other irregularities, how come the Democrats and RINO (a pejorative that stands for Republican in name only) Republicans, like Wacky Susan Collins, are desperately trying to pass legislation that will not allow the Vice President to change the results of the election?” the statement read.

“Actually, what they are saying is that Mike Pence did have the right to change the outcome, and they now want to take that right away.”

But Pence, who hours after a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, presided over the joint legislative session that certified then-President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, said the constitution is clear on the matter.

“Under the constitution, I had no right to change the outcome of our election. And (current Vice President) Kamala Harris will have no right to overturn the election when we beat them in 2024,” Pence said at Friday’s gathering.

“Under Article II Section One, elections are conducted at the state level, not by the Congress. The only role Congress has with respect to the Electoral College is to open and count votes submitted and certified by the states. No more no less,” he added. EFE

ar-lce/mc

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