Trump Judged That He Could Invalidate The 2020 Election Results, Mike Pence: Wrong, The Presidency Belongs To The US People

Mike Pence bersama Donald Trump. (Wikimedia Commons/The White House)

JAKARTA - Former United States Vice President Mike Pence issued a sharp rebuke to his former boss, former President Donald Trump, Friday, calling him wrong to believe Pence could overturn the results of the 2020 US presidential election, which Trump claims were stolen from him.

After losing the 2020 Presidential Election to Democratic nominee Joe Biden in November 2020, Republican Donald Trump pressured Pence to block Congressional certification from the results while leading the process on January 6, 2021, in a bid to keep his office.

Pence, a loyal coworker during Trump's tumultuous four-year presidency, chose not to block certification.

Trump has often belittled Pence since then, and on Sunday reportedly issued a new statement saying the former vice president could "reverse" the election.

"President Trump was wrong," Pence said in a speech to the Federalist Society, a conservative legal organization, in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, citing Reuters Feb. 5.

"I have no right to annul an election. The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people themselves. And frankly, there is no idea more un-American than the idea that anyone can vote for an American president," Pence said.

Former US Vice President Mike Pence. (Wikimedia Commons/US Air Force)

Pence's comments represent his most powerful criticism of Trump to date. A Trump spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

"I understand the disappointment that many people felt about the last election. I took part in the vote," Pence said.

"Whatever happens in the future, I know we did our job that day. John Quincy Adams reminds us: The task is ours; the result belongs to God," Pence added, citing a 19th-century US president.

"And there's actually a lot more at stake than our party or our political fortunes. Men and women: if we lose faith in the Constitution, not only will we lose the election, we will lose our country," Pence said.

It is known that while Pence was leading the certification, mobs of Trump supporters stormed Capitol Hill in a failed attempt to stop the certification. Pence and members of the US House of Representatives inside the Capitol take cover from the rioters. In a speech on Friday, Pence called January 6 a "dark day."

Pence's comments contradicted Republicans, who on Friday criticized US Republican Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for joining the House of Representatives elected committee investigating the January 6 attacks.

The party said the Democratic-led investigation persecuted "ordinary citizens who engage in legitimate political discourse."

Separately, Olivia Troye, Pence's former national security aide who has become a critic of Trump, said this was the first time she had heard her former boss publicly say Trump was wrong.

"This is the beginning," Troye wrote on Twitter.