Former Vice President Mike Pence 's top aide testified before the House committee probing the January 6 Capitol riot last week, ...
Former Vice President Mike Pence's top aide testified before the House committee probing the January 6 Capitol riot last week, a Monday report revealed.
Marc Short served as Pence's chief of staff from March 2019 through the end of this term. His hearing with the House select committee could signal Pence's former White House team's willingness to cooperate with the investigation.
Short testified for hours in-person at the Capitol last Wednesday, a source familiar with the matter told CNN. It followed a subpoena and months of discussions between Short's attorney Emmet Flood and lawyers on the committee.
The panel is still unsure if Pence will testify but the committee is in early talks with his legal team seeking some form of cooperation.
Multiple sources claim Pence would prefer his aides act as a 'proxy' so the former VP doesn't have to appear.
Obtaining Short's testimony comes as the panel tries to get to the bottom of an alleged pressure campaign by then-President Donald Trump and his staff to get Pence to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential elections.
Pence, as vice president and therefore president of the Senate, did not have the power to overturn the elections as Trump thought. His role in the certification process is to oversee Congress as it votes to uphold the Electoral College votes from each state, which ultimately ended up declaring Biden the winner.
Trump, it's reported, believes Pence could have unilaterally stopped Congress from certifying Biden's win, which the former president still claims was 'rigged' in an election riddled with 'fraud.'
Former Vice President Mike Pence's White House Chief of Staff Marc Short quietly testified last Wednesday before the House committee investigating the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot, a source told CNN
It's still not clear if Pence (right) will testify before the committee as they try to get to the bottom of an alleged pressure campaign by then-President Donald Trump and his staff to get Pence to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential elections
The 45th president has repeatedly blamed his No. 2 for his election loss.
In a Sunday evening statement, Trump bluntly admitted for the first time that he was trying to use Pence to overturn the election result.
He pointed to efforts on Capitol Hill to change the Electoral Count Act, including firming up language to make clear the vice president is only there to count votes and can't override the will of the voters.
'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,' Trump wrote in his statement from his Save America PAC email. 'Unfortunately, he didn't exercise that power, he could have overturned the Election!'
Trump argued, '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 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?'
Pence is speaking at the Federalist Society gathering in Florida this week and a source familiar with his thinking says he may respond to Trump's statements about him at that forum.
Trump said in a Sunday statement it's clear Pence could have overturned the election. He pointed to efforts on Capitol Hill to change the Electoral Count Act, including firming up the language to make clear that the vice president is only there to count votes and can't override the will of the voters
Vice presidents also act as presidents of the Senate when they are in office. They cannot override the Senate certifying presidential election results as reported by the Electoral College. Pictured: Pence on Capitol Hill for the election certification on January 6, 2021
A source close to Pence said of the potential to 'overturn' the results: 'There was a lot of pressure, but we always knew we were doing the right thing.'
Short was at the Capitol on January 6, 2021 and was also part of a White House meeting two days prior.
Before testifying last week, Short has already supplied subpoenaed documents to the committee, one source told CNN. This included a memo from Trump aide Johnny McEntee comparing the former president to Thomas Jefferson.
Another source familiar with Short's cooperation said it's typical witnesses will hand over additional documents when they testify before a congressional panel.
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