Speaking to reporters while campaigning in Indiana on Wednesday, former Vice President did not mince words when discussing his old boss Donald Trump’s third indictment over efforts to overturn the 2020 election, doubling down on his assertion that the former president is unfit to hold office again.

“President Trump asked me to put him over the Constitution,” Pence said of Jan. 6, 2021.

“But I chose the Constitution, and I always will,” the former Indiana governor, who is going up against the former president for the 2024 Republican nomination, continued.

What You Need To Know

  • Former Vice President Mike Pence on Wednesday doubled down on his assertion that former President Donald Trump is unfit to serve in the White House again after his indictment over efforts to overturn the 2020 election

  • Pence, who once upon a time battled with the Justice Department to avoid testifying in the probe, charged that "Trump asked me to put him over the Constitution" by asking him to overturn the election results on Jan. 6, 2021

  • The former vice president went on to say that Trump’s actions are “contrary” to the Constitution and the country’s laws, but “crackpot lawyers” told the former president what he wanted to hear

  • Trump, meanwhile, railed against his former vice president in a post on his social media platform while continuing to falsely claim that Pence did, indeed, have the power to overturn the election

“I really do believe that anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” Pence said. “And anyone who asks someone else to put themselves over the constitution should never be President of the United States again. I’ve been very forthright about this issue and I’ll continue to be.”

Trump was charged on Tuesday with four counts related to efforts to overturn the election, including conspiracy to defraud the United States. The former president is expected in court on Thursday.

Pence, who once upon a time battled with the Justice Department to avoid testifying in the probe, now finds himself central to the indictment that was unsealed Tuesday. Among the claims in the indictment, Trump said that Pence was “too honest” for rebuffing his baseless claims that the vice president had the power to overturn the election results.

After the indictment came down on Tuesday, Pence said that it “serves as an important reminder: Anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States. Our country is more important than one man. Our Constitution is more important than any one man’s career.”

Campaigning at the Indiana State Fair on Wednesday, Pence reiterated that “irrespective of the indictment, I want the American people to know that I had no right to overturn the election.”

“With regard to the substance of the indictment, I've been very clear: I had hoped it wouldn't come to this,” Pence said. “I had hoped that this issue and the judgment of the president’s actions that day would be left to the American people.

“But now it's been brought in a criminal indictment, and I can't assess whether or not the government has the evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt what they assert in the indictment and the president's entitled to a presumption of innocence,” Pence continued. “But for my part, I want people to know that I had no right to overturn the election, and that what the president maintained that day, and, frankly, has said over and over again over the last two and a half years, is completely false.”

Pence went on to say that Trump’s actions are “contrary” to the Constitution and the country’s laws, but “crackpot lawyers” told the former president what he wanted to hear.

“Sadly, the president was surrounded by a group of crackpot lawyers that kept telling him what his itching ears wanted to hear,” Pence said. “And while I made my case to him of what I understood my oath to the Constitution to require, the president ultimately, ultimately continued to demand that I choose him over the Constitution.”

In a Fox News interview on Wednesday, Pence contended that Trump “and his gaggle of crackpot lawyers asked me to literally reject votes, which would have resulted in the issue being turned over to the House of Representatives,” which he said would have resulted in “chaos.”

“People can read the indictment,” Pence told the outlet. “And frankly, I've said before, I had hoped it had not come to this point. I don't know if the government can meet the standard, the burden of proof beyond reasonable doubt, for criminal charges.

“But the American people deserve to know that President Trump and his advisers didn't just ask me to pause, they asked me to reject votes, return votes, essentially to overturn the election,” Pence continued. “And to keep faith with the oath that I made to the American people and to Almighty God, I rejected that out of hand and I did my duty that day.”

Trump, meanwhile, railed against his former vice president in a post on his social media platform while continuing to falsely claim that Pence did, indeed, have the power to overturn the election.

“I feel badly for Mike Pence, who is attracting no crowds, enthusiasm, or loyalty from people who, as a member of the Trump Administration, should be loving him,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Wednesday afternoon. “He didn’t fight against Election Fraud, which we will now be easily able to prove based on the most recent Fake Indictment & information which will have to be made available to us, finally - a really BIG deal. The V.P. had power that Mike didn’t understand, but after the Election, the RINOS & Dems changed the law, taking that power away!”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.