Republican Sen. Marco Rubio refused to say former President Donald Trump was wrong to press then-Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election, and he later called the Jan. 6 committee “a partisan scam.” During an appearance Sunday on Face the Nation, host Margaret Brennan asked Rubio if he agreed with Pence’s recent comments that Trump was “wrong” to push him to reject electors from certain battleground states.
Rubio, who called Trump a “con artist” before becoming a fervent supporter, responded, “Well, if President Trump runs for re-election, I believe he would defeat Joe Biden, and I don’t want Kamala Harris to have the power as vice president to overturn that election, and I don’t — that’s the same thing that I concluded back in January of 2021. You know, when that issue was raised, I looked at it, had analyzed it and came to the same conclusion that vice presidents can’t simply decide not to certify an election.”
Florida GOP @SenRubioPress tells @margbrennan he agrees with Mike Pence that the VP “can’t simply decide not to certify an election” but avoids saying that former President Trump is wrong for saying so. pic.twitter.com/u16D9Etzus
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) February 6, 2022
“So Donald Trump was wrong?” Brennan pressed.
Rubio again dodged answering the question directly. “Well, as I said, I just don’t think a vice president has that power because if the vice president has that power, Donald Trump would defeat Joe Biden in four years or two years, and then Kamala Harris can decide… to overturn the election. I don’t want to wind up there.”
Brennan then brought up the Republican National Committee’s recent declaration that the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol was “legitimate political discourse,” as well as its decision to censure of GOP Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for serving on the Jan. 6 committee.
“Does the RNC speak for you when it says that this is a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse. Was Jan. 6 legitimate political discourse?” Brennan asked.
“Anybody who committed crimes on Jan. 6 should be prosecuted,” Rubio responded. “If you entered the Capitol and you committed acts of violence and you were there to hurt people, you should be prosecuted and they are being prosecuted. But the Jan. 6 commission is not the place to do this. That’s what prosecutors are supposed to do. This commission is a partisan scam.”
Rubio went on to call the panel “nothing but a partisan tool designed to go out and smear and attack and get their hands on as many people as they can.” (Again, two Republicans sit on this allegedly “partisan” committee.)
.@SenRubioPress tells @margbrennan that those who entered the Capitol and committed crimes on January 6 “should be prosecuted” but calls the House committee investigating the attack “a partisan scam.” pic.twitter.com/NbypKecQRo
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) February 6, 2022
So far, the committee has interviewed hundreds of individuals as part of its investigation into the causes of Jan. 6 and security failures that led to the breach of the Capitol. It has referred two close Trump allies, Steve Bannon and Mark Meadows, to the Justice Department for contempt of Congress after both refused to cooperate with subpoenas. Bannon was indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of contempt in November.
Source: RollingStone
