The real reason Donald Trump is arguing in court that Mike Pence can be indicted
Last week Donald Trump called a press conference and repeatedly urged the media to investigate Mike Pence’s phone calls with the President of Ukraine. Then Trump’s people leaked the details of Pence’s involvement in the scandal to the media. It couldn’t have been any more obvious that Trump was trying to throw Pence under the bus. But how far would Trump take this? As it turns out, all the way.
When Donald Trump’s lawyers were in court today arguing that the House Democrats have no right to any evidence because a sitting president can’t be indicted, his lawyers made a point of also stating their belief that a sitting vice president can be indicted, as highlighted during Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show on Tuesday evening. Wait a minute, what?
From a legal standpoint, we know where this is coming from. The decades-old DOJ memo that says a sitting president can’t be indicted, also says that a sitting VP can be indicted; the memo was little more than a way of pressuring Spiro Agnew to resign. It’s not at all surprising that Trump is relying on the “president can’t be indicted” part of the memo. But it’s noteworthy, and in fact eyebrow raising, that Trump is pushing the “VP can be indicted” part of the memo.
Make no mistake: Donald Trump has his lawyers in court right now, trying to get Mike Pence criminally indicted. That’s remarkable, considering Attorney General Bill Barr could in fact indict Pence any time he wants. So why would Trump want to do something so deranged?
Earlier, Palmer Report made the argument that if Donald Trump can get rid of Mike Pence, it’ll leave Senate Republicans in a situation where if they oust Trump, they’ll be making Nancy Pelosi the president. Former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade made the same argument on the Maddow show tonight. It’s clear that Trump is trying to throw Pence under the bus. Now it’s a question of whether Trump really is going to take things as far as threatening to indict Pence to try to force him to resign.
