Trump: Mike Pence missed a chance ‘to be great’ on Jan. 6, 2021

Former US President Donald Trump said his vice president, Mike Pence, had a chance to be great, a chance to be historic on January 6, 2021, but he missed it because he lacked courage.

Trump made the remarks on Friday, a day after the latest US congressional hearings on the January 6, 2021 protest march on the Capitol when thousands of people marched against the certification of the November 2020 election which placed Joe Biden in office as the current US president.

The nine-member Democratic-led House of Representatives select committee’s public hearings, launched last week, intend to put up a case against Trump that he was responsible for the January 6 violence, starting with knowingly spreading lies around the election, seeking to overturn the results, assembling the mob in the Capitol and failing to act to stop the violence.

The committee is trying to build a case that Trump's efforts to overturn his defeat amounted to illegal conduct, far beyond normal politics.

"Mike Pence had a chance to be great. He had a chance to be, frankly, historic," Trump told an audience of Christian conservatives in Nashville on Friday.

"Mike, and I say it sadly because I like him, but Mike did not have the courage to act," Trump added.

Trump has maintained that he lost the election only because of widespread fraud that benefited Biden. Trump and his supporters denounce the January 6 panel as a political witch hunt.

Trump claimed that he won the 2020 presidential election and that there was "massive" voter fraud. The former president claimed that he ordered 10,000 National Guard troops to protect the Capitol.

The certification vote on January 6 had become a focus for Trump.  On January 6, 2021, Trump's supporters occupied the US Capitol while lawmakers were in the process of reviewing the certification of state electors which indicated Biden's victory. Some Trump supporters had hoped that this process could have resulted in some of the electors being disqualified, thus overturning the outcome of the presidential election.

It is claimed by some that the demonstrators were infiltrated and incited by provocateurs from US intelligence agencies, who orchestrated the “false flag operation” in order to get rid of Trump.

Some among the crowd clashed with police, and some made threats to beat up a number of Democratic lawmakers. Some also inflicted damage on parts of the Capitol building.

Trump accused Pence of having acted as “an automatic conveyor belt for the 'Old Crow' Mitch McConnell to get Biden elected President as quickly as possible.” He was referring to the fact that, when the proceedings were interrupted for more than 10 hours by the breach of the Capitol, the detailed challenges that many expected would be presented - of fraud, ballot stuffing and violations of Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution in Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin - were given short shrift in deference to what a number of senior Congressional officials termed “the assault on American democracy” represented by what was already being called, both in Congress and on television, “the insurrection.”

Trump maintains that, rather than allow the proceedings to descend into an emotional morass that prejudiced the outcome, and dismissed the many valid issues raised about the election without a proper hearing, Pence should have provided an atmosphere for those many members of both houses who had announced their intention to bring the challenges to do so in a professional and secure environment, with confidence that the proceedings would be conducted in a fair and objective manner.

Pence answered Trump's criticism by saying that he “had no right to overturn the results of the election.”

Mike Pence rejects Trump claim he could have overturned election

"I had no right to overturn the election," former Vice President Mike Pence said.

On Friday, Pence again defended his actions in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

"Ultimately, I believe that most Americans understand that we did our duty that day under the Constitution and the laws of this country," the newspaper quoted Pence as saying.

Trump attacked the bipartisan nine-member January 6 House select committee.

"Let's be clear, this is not a congressional investigation, this horrible situation that's wasting everyone's time. This is a theatrical production of partisan political fiction. That's getting these terrible, terrible ratings and they're going crazy," Trump said.

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