WASHINGTON, D.C.–Marc Short, the former chief of staff for Mike Pence, believes the former vice president and Indiana governor chose to rebuke former President Donald Trump in remarks last week because Trump’s comments about Pence’s ability to overturn the 2020 presidential election “merited response.”
On Friday, Pence said “President Trump is wrong” by saying that Pence had the right to overturn the 2020 election on January 6, 2021.
“I think that the vice president has commented on January 6 on several occasions, including last summer at the Ronald Reagan Library. And he extended those remarks a little bit this week at the Federalist Society primarily because the President’s comments about the vice president had the ability to overturn the election, I think merited response,” said Short on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday.
Short also didn’t call the 2020 election rigged or fraudulent, but he did express concern about voting irregularities.
“The reality is that there was not enough significant fraud that was presented that would have overturned any of those states’ elections. But I believe that Joe Biden is the duly elected president of the United States, yes,” said Short.
Short also acknowledged that there were conversations about alternate slates of electors, which was a scheme to put forward illegitimate electors from certain states that Trump lost to subvert the Electoral College, but that the plan didn’t carry much weight.
“There were discussions about alternate slates. Unless they’re certified by the state they’re candidly meaningless and so didn’t put much weight into that,” said Short.
Short put the onus on Trump’s advisers, and not the former President directly.
“I think, unfortunately, the President had many bad advisers who were basically snake oil salesman giving him really random and novel ideas as to what the vice president could do,” said Short.
Short also believes it is unlikely that Pence gets subpoenaed by the January 6th Committee.
“I think that would be a pretty unprecedented step for the committee to take. It would be, I think, very difficult for me to see that scenario unfolding. I think it’s very different to subpoena a former vice president to talk about private conversations with the President of the United States. It’s never happened before. I am hopeful that the committee does end up providing an impartial review. But I think there’s good reason to be skeptical that they will, because truly it has taken on a more partisan committee,” said Short.
In a separate interview with CBS’s Face the Nation, Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio said Pence did the right thing.
“If President Trump runs for re-election, I believe he would defeat Joe Biden. I don’t want Kamala Harris to have the power as Vice President to have the power to overturn that election. That’s the same thing I concluded back in January 2021,” said Rubio.
You can watch Short’s full interview at the bottom of the page.
