Rep Liz Cheney, vice chair of the January 6 House select committee, says that the panel still wants to hear directly from former Vice President Mike Pence.
“Look, he played a critical role on January 6. If he had succumbed to the pressure that Donald Trump was putting on him, we would have had a much worse constitutional crisis,” she told Jonathan Karl, chief Washington correspondent for ABC News, on Friday.
“And I think that he has clearly, as he’s expressed, concerns about executive privilege, which, you know, I have tremendous respect. I think it’s, you know, hugely important constitutional issue in terms of separation of powers.”
Earlier this week the former vice president said he would consider giving evidence before the House January 6 select committee if he were to receive an invitation to appear before the panel.
Mr Pence, who became a target of the pro-Trump mob during the Capitol riot on the day Congress certified Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election over Donald Trump, was speaking at a “Politics and Eggs” breakfast event in New Hampshire on Wednesday when he was asked if he’d be willing to appear before the select committee.
“I would consider it,” he said.
The former vice president has also said that he would have serious constitutional issues about appearing before the panel, CNN reports, and a person with knowledge of Mr Pence’s thinking on the matter urged the network to not read too much into his remarks.
Ms Cheney acknowledged Mr Pence’s concerns: “I believe in executive privilege. I think it matters. But I also think that when the country has been through something, as grave as this was, everyone who has information has an obligation to step forward. So, I would hope that he will do that.”
Asked if the former vice president will appear before the committee in September when it resumes its work, Ms Cheney said: “I would hope that he will understand how important it is for the American people to know every aspect of the truth about what happened that day.”
Two of Mr Pence’s top aides, ex-counsel to the vice president Greg Jacob and his former chief of staff, Marc Short, have already given evidence in the select committee’s probe into the January 6 insurrection.
In June, Mr Jacob told the select committee that his office had determined that a plan floated by Trump ally John Eastman, under which Mr Pence would have unilaterally rejected electoral votes from swing states won by Mr Biden, had no valid basis in US law.
He added that Mr Pence’s own evaluation of the Trump plan led him to conclude that the framers of the US constitution “could not possibly have intended to empower the Vice President to reject duly ascertained electoral votes, or to unilaterally suspend the constitutionally mandated vote counting proceedings”.
Last month, select committee member Adam Kinzinger said the panel was considering requesting that Mr Pence provide testimony in written interrogatories, and committee members have been considering issuing either a request for a voluntary appearance or a subpoena for the former vice-president.
Speaking in New Hampshire on Wednesday, Mr Pence said: “Under the Constitution, we have three co-equal branches of government, and any invitation to be directed to me, I would have to reflect on the unique role I was serving in as vice president. It would be unprecedented in history for a vice president to be summoned to testify on Capitol Hill. But, as I said, I don’t want to pre-judge, so if there’s ever any formal invitation rendered to us, we would give it due consideration.”
Mr Pence is not entirely correct to say it is “unprecedented” for a vice president to testify before Congress. In the past, both presidents and vice presidents have done so.
Rep Zoe Lofgren, another member of the committee, told CNN’s Erin Burnett on Friday night that her “ears perked up” when she heard Mr Pence’s remarks.
“We have learned an awful lot about what happened with the vice president because so many of his close associates have come in and testified quite honestly and at length,” Ms Lofgren said. “But sure, it would be great to hear from the vice president, and I don’t know whether it was an offhand comment or whether it was a message to us to send him an invitation but we are certainly going to pursue it.”
When asked further about Mr Pence’s comments, Ms Cheney said she had not seen them but said it sounded similar to what the committee has heard from his legal counsel.
The committee has expressed a desire to have Mr Pence testify under oath since January.
Asked whether former President Trump would be called to testify, Ms Cheney said she had no announcements to make.
Pushed further on the topic of asking Mr Trump to appear, she said: “Yes. I mean, I don’t — again, I don’t want to get in front of committee deliberations about that. I do think it’s very important, as I said in the first hearing or the second hearing, you know, his interactions with our committee will be under oath.”
