Updated
Summary
On the morning of January 6, when Mike Pence finally told Donald Trump in a phone call initiated by Donald Trump, that he wasn`t going to break the law for Donald Trump. Donald was very mean to Mike on the phone. No wife or husband of a Supreme Court justice has engaged in public political activism the way Clarence Thomas` wife has done to the point where she may have broken the law.
Transcript
LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: Good evening, Rachel.
We`re going to have Adam Schiff join us. He`s a member of the committee.
And based on what you are saying a few minutes ago. I`m going to ask him, if their investigation, talking to the Pence staff, did anyone explain to the committee why the day before January 6th, when Donald Trump put out a statement saying Mike Pence and I completely agree that Mike Pence has the authority to reject electors, why didn`t Mike Pence immediately put out a statement saying, no, this is my position? Why did he wait until the next day, that when the attack in the Capitol was already underway?
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST, “TRMS”: Yes. I mean, he could`ve said I want everyone in America including those who are coming to Washington tomorrow to support me and the president, I want everybody to be under no illusions, I do not have the power to throughout the election results, nor does any individual American as our forefathers said. And we look forward to seeing you tomorrow, and MAGA forever. But I`m not going to do that.
O`DONNELL: Yeah. I mean, all we saw today was that his chief of staff, calls up the Trump guy and complains about it. But why don`t you — why don`t you just put out the vice presidential statement immediately?
MADDOW: Yes, a very good point. —
O`DONNELL: And maybe they`re not showing us every single thing they`ve obtained and every question and answer with everyone. And maybe, the Congressman Schiff could tell us that they did have some exchanges about why did the vice president didn`t make a statement that they. They might have that in their. We`ll see what Congressman Schiff have to say.
MADDOW: Go for it, Lawrence. We`ll see you.
O`DONNELL: Thank you, Rachel.
He did his duty. That`s what Liz Cheney said today about Mike Pence, at the beginning of the January 6 committee hearing. He stayed true to his oath. That`s what Democratic Congressman Pete Aguilar said a few minutes later. As he began guiding the hearing, focusing on what Vice President Mike Pence did, leading up to and during January 6th 2021, when a violent mob of Trump supporters attacked Congress, believing they were following Donald Trump`s orders.
In the end, Mike Pence did the right thing. The question not asked in today`s hearing was, why did he wait until the end? Aides to Mike Pence testify today that he never wavered in his belief, that the vice president had no authority to reject electoral votes, when they were counted by Congress on January 6th.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PETE AGUILAR (D-CA): Did the vice president ever waiver his position that he could not unilaterally decide which electors to accept?
GREG JACOB, FORMER CHIEF COUNSEL TO V.P. MIKE PENCE: The vice president never budged from the position that I`ve described as his first instinct, which was, that it just made no sense from everything that he knew, and had studied about our Constitution, that one person would have that kind of authority.
AGUILAR: And did the vice president ever wavered in his position that he could not delay certification, and sent it back to the states?
JACOB: No, he did not.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: He never wavered in his position, and he never wavered in his refusal to stake his position publicly. Counsel to the vice president, Greg Jacob, testified that he first discussed the procedure for January 6th with Vice President Pence, on December 7th.
(BEGIN VDEO CLIP)
JACOB: He told me that he had been, first, elected to Congress in 2000. And then, one of his earliest memories as a congressman was sitting in on the 2001 certification, and he recalled that Al Gore had gaveled down a number of objections that have been raised in Florida.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Mike Pence has known since he saw Al Gore do it, that the vice president has only a ministerial function on January 6, that has no power to change the electoral vote count. He knew it for 20 years. And he still said nothing. Nothing.
On December 19th, Donald Trump summoned his troops to Washington for a rally on January 6th. That would have been a very good day for vice president of the United States to announce that nothing can change the Electoral College count on January 6th. Could`ve made that announcement on the day Donald Trump made the announcement that it will be a rally on January 6th.
But Mike Pence decided not to tell Donald Trump, and Trump voters the truth, because Mike Pence was still clinging to the dream that someday, those Trump voters would be voting for Mike Pence for president. And so, he didn`t want to be the bearer of bad news to see future voters. And so, the man who never wavered privately, good not supportive, publicly of every Trump lie, every one of them, until 1:00 pm on January 6th.
[22:05:11]
While Donald Trump was delivering his speech, telling his violent fanatical mob to go to the capitol and fight like hell. Only during that speech did Mike Pence issue a written public statement, saying, it is my considered judgment that my oath to support and defend the Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.
Mike Pence could have said exactly that, a month earlier, but he decided to stay silent. He could have said it a day earlier, but Mike Pence chose silence. Mike Pence stayed silent, about what he was going to do on January 6th until the capitol was already under attack, and that`s when he did the right thing.
If Mike Pence had said that a month earlier how many people would have come to Washington on January 6th? Surely, some of them would`ve stayed home. Would Donald Trump even bother to have that rally on January 6, if Mike Pence said clearly, and emphatically, and repeatedly, beginning on December 7th, what he finally said, timidly in writing, on January 6th?
The most important point established by the committee today is that Donald Trump knew it was against the law for Mike Pence to reject any electoral vote. Donald Trump knew that. He knew that he was urging Mike Pence to commit a crime. Everyone knew it. Everyone knew it was illegal, including the lawyer, who everyone thought was crazy, but whose advice Donald Trump was following.
Attorney John Eastman was the originator of the theory that Mike Pence could reject the electoral votes on January 6th. And here`s how illegal, how criminal he knew his idea was. After January 6th, John Eastman asked Rudy Giuliani to put his name on the pardon list. It was attorney John Eastman`s considered legal opinion that he needed a pardon for the crime he was urging the president to do.
Because John Eastman knew he was urging the president to urge Mike Pence to commit a crime. John Eastman also urged Mike Pence to staff to agree that Mike Pence should commit that crime. And in John`s testimony to the January 6th Committee, he did nothing but hide behind the Fifth Amendment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN EASTMAN, TRUMP ALLY: I assert my Fifth Amendment right against being compelled a witness against myself.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did the Trump legal team ask you to prepare a memorandum, regarding the vice president`s role in the counting of the total votes, during the joint session of Congress on January 6, 2021?
EASTMAN: Fifth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dr. Eastman, did you advise the president of the United States that the vice president could reject electors from seven states, and declare that the president has won?
EASTMAN: Fifth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dr. Eastman, the first sentence of the memo start off by saying, seven states have transmitted dual slates of electors to the president of the Senate. Is that statement, in this memo, true?
EASTMAN: Fifth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did President Trump authorize you to the to discuss publicly, on January 4th, 2021, conversations with him?
EASTMAN: Fifth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, to your position that you can discuss and the media, direct conversations you had with the president of the United States, that you will not discuss, are the same conversations with this committee.
EASTMAN: Fifth.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: John Eastman refused to answer the committee`s questions because he believed his answers could incriminate him in crime. Crimes he committed with the president of the United States, the president who refused to give him a pardon for those potential crimes.
We don`t know every question John Eastman was asked in his step with the committee. But if he was asked about his communications with Clarence Thomas`s wife, then he probably took the Fifth Amendment for that question too.
Yesterday, “The Washington Post” revealed that Virginia Thomas exchanged emails with John Eastman, at a time when Virginia Thomas was urging White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, in text messages already made public, to break the law, and overturn the results of the presidential election.
We reported last night of the January 6 Committee was considering whether to ask Virginia Thomas to testify.
[22:10:05]
And today, Chairman Bennie Thompson said the committee has sent a letter to Virginia Thomas, asking for her testimony. Ginni Thomas told the Trump supporting “Daily Caller”, quote, I can`t wait to clear up misconceptions. I look forward to talking to them.
Leading off our discussion tonight, Barry Berke, who served as special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during Trump`s first impeachment trial. And chief impeachment counsel during Donald Trump`s second impeachment trial.
Also with us, Neal Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, and MSNBC legal analyst.
Neal, what were the highlights of today`s hearings for you?
NEAL KATYAL, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Well, first of all, I want to say I think it started with exactly the right question, which is why Vice President Pence waited until January 6th to announce his opposition to the crazy scheme that everyone knew was unconstitutional?
But the second part, the second question or corollary to what you are saying, which is why is the vice president waited until now, or in fact, even now, he still hasn`t come before the committee and told us the truth of what happened on that day, or the proceeding days, what`s happened afterwards?
And so, the vice president, you know, what stands out for me is that the vice president`s aides they were brave and told the truth under oath before this congressional committee. And the vice president himself gets a lot of credit for what he did, ultimately, on January 6th. But we are missing a huge character in this story, and the committee has done a great job of trying to fill in those details with these aides.
But here we have one of the most horrific days in American history. We have one of the most horrific presidential actions in American history. And we have a vice president who is AWOL right now, who`s not — doesn`t have the guts to come and tell the American people what the president did to him into the country on that day and the proceeding days. I think it`s unforgivable.
O`DONNELL: Barry Berke, I wouldn`t presume to focus their attention, at least in the first question, given that you have all of this experience in these kinds of hearings. So, as you are watching this one today, where the highlights for you?
BARRY BERKE, FORMER HOUSE IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY CHIEF COUNSEL: I thought it was a great day for democracy. What Donald Trump does so well is he normalizes that indefensible, and he`s done that with his assault on democracy. And while it was done in a ham-handed amorous way, based on crazy theories, people believe it enough to storm the Capitol, to prevent the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in our history. It almost succeeded, but for Mike Pence, and most importantly, it created a roadmap for others to follow in future elections.
We have candidates, running on the platform that they`re going to do with Donald Trump tried to do. So, today, you have people saying, it was not only abnormal what`s needed but it violated the law, likely criminal. And you had it coming out of the mouths of his own supporters, not just Mike Pence, those people close to him, those people in his administration who all were prepared to say, even if Mike Pence didn`t say in person, they were all prepared to say they would put, democracy, our free and fair elections over their own personal interests, something Donald Trump would never do.
And I think hearing it from that crowd was so important, even if we didn`t have everyone.
O`DONNELL: Which was very clear, I, think in the hearing is that the vice president, vice president Pence`s legal counsel, Greg Jacob, was a very competent legal counsel to a vice president. No reason to consult anyone beyond him about the procedure for January 6th, but Mike Pence did. There are reports that he asked Dan Quayle and others. I want people he consulted with is Michael Luttig, who testified today, distinguished judge and a law professor.
Let`s listen to one of the things that he said today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
J. MICHAEL LUTTIG, RETIRED FEDERAL JUDGE: There was no basis in the Constitution or laws of the United States at all for the theory espoused by Mr. Eastman, at all, none. I would have laid my body across the road before I would have let the vice president overturn the 2020 election on the basis of that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Neal Katyal, what was your reaction to that?
KATYAL: It was as profound as I could say in words, Lawrence. So when you call Judge Luttig distinguished, that undersells him. I mean, for conservatives, he`s like the equivalent of President Reagan for judges. There is no one more respected, when I was in law school, for the next 20 years than Judge Luttig among conservatives, and indeed, among liberals.
[22:15:00]
You know, we follow with them all the time. But he was brilliant, careful. This is a guy who was the short — number two on the shortlist of the Supreme Court, Justice Alito ultimately get got that seat.
But this is as respected in this die hard conservative, and then as you will find, and who is he saying that about, about the crazy advice, his own former law clerk, John Eastman. So, I guess congratulations for Ted Cruz today, because he`s no longer Judge Luttig`s worse law clerk — but you know, I think what it really showed me is what I think American constitutional law is all about. What`s our Constitution is all about.
It`s not about putting your guys in power, or anything like that, it`s about dividing power, but transitions of power, and the like. And John Eastman ultimately embodies the jurisprudence that through the entire Trump administration, believe in small government and separation of powers, except with, I don`t know, you ban Muslims, or you want to overturn elections, then you throw all these principles out.
Judge Luttig showed us the real principles today.
O`DONNELL: And John Eastman who is guiding Donald Trump`s thinking on this great extent was all over the map on this issue. He argued against it at the beginning of this theory, as it was emerging. And then, on different days, when he was talking to Jacob, when he was talking to the vice president`s counsel, he would admit just how weak the idea was. Let`s listen to this discussion about how the Supreme Court would treat this idea.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. PETE AGUILAR (D-CA): Did Dr. Eastman ever tell you what he thought the U.S. Supreme Court would do, if it had to decide this issue?
JACOB: Yes. We had an extended discussion, an hour and a half to two hours on January 5th. And when I pressed him on that point, I said, John, if the vice president did what you are asking him to do we would lose nine to nothing in the Supreme Court, wouldn`t we? And he initially started — well, I think maybe you would lose only 7 to 2. And after some further discussions, acknowledged, well, yeah, you`re right, we would lose nine to nothing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Barry Berke, so there is a lawyer, advocating a legal position that he says, he agrees and that conversation, pretty much the entire Supreme Court is going to find illegal.
BERKE: I thought that was very effective, and very satisfying to me. I represented Pennsylvania the 2020 election, and in the impeachment, I spent a lot of time on the Electoral Count Act. This 1876 statute is very complex.
The American people are not going to read it. So instead, to have all these prestigious people conservative judges, you know, the people in the administration, John Eastman himself that the Supreme Court would vote 9 to 0. That shows that this was crazy talk, that Donald Trump and everybody else knew that this was made up, the notion that one man could overturn the will of the American people, that goes against the foundation of our system of government, free and fair elections.
I thought it was very effective. And getting that out, that`s what he admitted, that he told the president, that he thought Eastman sent. The president got something stuck in his mind like this is the only way he has a chance of actually keeping his power, because he was rejected by the courts, by his own Department of Justice, by the state legislatures, but the state officials, who wouldn`t find him votes. So that`s why he was clinging to this.
And I think that narrative, that Donald Trump`s singular responsibility for this horror show really came out clear today.
O`DONNELL: Neal Katyal, one objective today seem to be consciousness of guilt on the part of Donald Trump. How did the committee deal with that?
KATYAL: Superbly. And I really hope that the Justice Department hires more to prosecute this case, because they`ll do a phenomenal job. And Congress today gave a lot, had a lot to work with.
So, you got already so much — because Trump blew up 63 different court decisions, which set lost the election. And now, today, you have evidence from the committee, that not just Eastman, ultimately admitted this truth, the strategy was unlawful, even that information was conveyed to the president himself, and yet, he just blew it off, and just did what he wanted to do, because advanced his agenda, even if it but the American people and the transfer of power at risk.
O`DONNELL: Neal Katyal and Barry Berke, thank you both for joining us on this coverage hearing. Really appreciate it.
Thank you.
Coming up, Congressman Adam Schiff, a member of the January 6th Committee, will join us next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:24:07]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ERIC HERSCHMANN, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE LAWYER: You`re saying that you believe the vice president, acting as president of the Senate, can be the sole decision-maker as to, according to our theory, will become the next president of the United States? And he said yes.
I said, are you out of your own f`ing mind? I — that was pretty blunt. I said, you`re completely crazy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Joining us now, Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California. He`s chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, and he`s a member of the January 6th Select Committee, and was the lead impeachment manager for the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump.
Thank you very much for joining us tonight, Congressman Schiff.
One thing I`ve been wondering about is what prevented — has your investigation revealed anything that prevented Mike Pence from saying a month earlier, then January 6th, that the vice president does not have the power to reject any electors on January 6th?
[22:25:12]
REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): No, of course not. I mean, there would be nothing to prevent the vice president from the first time, the issue was raised, making it very clear to the public that the vice president doesn`t have this power. There is nothing — we argued this. You know, of course, Lawrence, there was so many other people who know that, now testified, or not testify.
Attorney General Barr could`ve told the country that I think maybe the president has lots lost his grip of reality. And yet, they didn`t. Look, I`m glad they`re speaking now, but the vice president took the action he did, you know, it was a critical time to do the right thing. But so much of the trauma the country has been through, we could have been spared, if people spoke out then, as they`re speaking out now.
O`DONNELL: Do you know when the vice presidents statement, that the written statement that he put out on January 6th, did you find out when it was drafted? Because it`s a multi-page statement that doesn`t look like it was written that morning.
SCHIFF: You know, I think that when we conclude our investigation, and I think that we haven`t revealed during the course of the public hearings, we will be revealing, either by subject matter or en mass, so will be disclosing that to the public. I don`t know the answer on the top of my head. I don`t know if I`ll be able to go into these particulars, even if I did, it`s not a matter of public record.
O`DONNELL: Was the primary objective of today`s hearing to establish consciousness of guilt in Donald Trump, with the testimony that several people told him, legal authorities in White House counsel`s office and elsewhere, told him that it would be against the law, it would be a violation of law for Mike Pence to try to change the Electoral College vote?
SCHIFF: It was certainly part of our goal today. The overriding objective what`s to tell the public the story of one of the lines of effort to over during the election, one of the multiple ways in which the president sought to prevent the peaceful transfer of power was to pressure his vice president into ignoring the Constitution, and to essentially, you know, bring one person educate adjudicator for the next president. But of course, in that blond blot, we wanted to wind down the president`s culpability. What`s he knew about how flawed it theory this was.
So, yes, this was very important. But you want to tell the broader story too of president lost election, a president can`t accept losing the election, president trots out his bogus claims of fraud, his own attorney general says they`re BS, so they fall back on a different plan. Let`s pressure Mike Pence into ignoring the Constitution, and declare me the winner, that even though, as you point out, we demonstrated he would never with a Supreme Court than anyone else.
O`DONNELL: So the committee sent a letter to Clarence Thomas`s wife today, asking for her cooperation, asking her to come in for conversation. She publicly said to the daily caller, a Trump supporting website, that she`s happy to clear up any confusion and answer questions.
Has the commute committee heard from Ginni Thomas yet?
SCHIFF: I don`t know whether we`ve heard directly, as opposed through “The Daily Caller”, as you point out. But I`m glad that she has responded favorably. We would like to hear what she has to say.
We have many questions to ask, and we wish that, frankly, all witnesses with relevant information would take the same attitude and come in and share with us what they know. Indeed, the whole situation of Representative Loudermilk, showing on that video, giving tours, it might have been avoided if except and come in and testified.
O`DONNELL: On one point John Eastman said that he believed Clarence Thomas would vote on the Supreme Court to support the vice president rejecting Electoral College votes. Do you have any indication that Eastman got that information from Ginni Thomas?
SCHIFF: You know, I really can`t go into the facts, until we have a chance to discuss those during whatever hearings, if that becomes a subject in one of our hearings.
[22:29:41]
You know, I will say, as I have in the past, Lawrence, that the idea that a Supreme Court justice would rule, presume to rule in a case in which the issue is whether congress should see documents that might reveal his own spouse`s communications on the subject, it just screams conflict of interest. And I can`t see how Justice Thomas can preside over any case related to this matter.
LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: Congressman Adam Schiff, thank you very much for joining us in our coverage tonight. We really appreciate it.
SCHIFF: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: And coming up, Mary Trump will join us, after that scene of some of her family in the Oval Office on January 6, that scene that we saw on video in the hearing today. Mary Trump is next.
[22:30:29]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: On the morning of January 6, when Mike Pence finally told Donald Trump in a phone call initiated by Donald Trump, that he wasn`t going to break the law for Donald Trump. Donald was very mean to Mike on the phone.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And who do you recall being in the Oval Office.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don Jr., Eric, Laura, Kimberly, with Meadows was there. At some point, Ivanka came in.
IVANKA TRUMP, DAUGHTER OF DONALD TRUMP: It wasn`t a specific, formal discussion. It was very sort of loosened casual.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So then you said at some point there`s a telephone conversation between the president and the vice president? Is that correct?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
TRUMP: When I entered the office the second time, he was on the telephone with who I later found out to be was the vice president.
Could you hear the vice president or only the president`s end?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Only at the president`s end.
Then at some point it started off as a calmer tone and everything and then became heated.
TRUMP: The conversation was pretty heated.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think, until it became somewhat louder tone. I don`t think I was paying attention to it initially.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you hear any part of the phone call? Even if just the end that the president was speaking from?
NICHOLAS LUNA, FORMER ASSISTANT TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: I did, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, what did you hear?
LUNA: So as I was dropping off the note, my memory — I remember hearing the word “wimp”. Either he called him a wimp. I remember he said, you are a wimp, you`ll be a wimp. Wimp is the word I remember.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s also been reported that the president said to the vice president, something to the effect that, you don`t have the courage to make a hard decision.
GEN. KEITH KELLOGG, FORMER PENCE NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR: I don`t remember exactly — it was something like that, yes.
Like, you are not tough enough to make the call.
TRUMP: It was a different tone than I heard him take with the vice president before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
Joining us now, Mary Trump, the niece of Donald Trump. She`s the host of the podcast, “The Mary Trump Show”, and author of “The Reckoning, Our Nation`s Trauma and Finding a Way to Heal”.
Mary Trump, I always think of you whenever I see those family scenes, like we did today in that scene in the Oval Office. I am sure you could easily, in your mind, fill in the blanks of what was said in that room.
MARY TRUMP, PODCAST HOST, “THE MARY TRUMP SHOW”: Yes, unfortunately, I think I can. What people need to understand is that Donald doesn`t believe that he should be denied anything he wants.
And when somebody who showed himself to be as weak and sycophantic as Mike Pence has the audacity — has the temerity — to stand up to him, Donald isn`t going to take it well. So that, I believe was probably the first moment that Donald started to think, wait a minute, I may not be getting my way as easily as I believe I should. And it probably sent everybody in that room into a full out panic.
O`DONNELL: I think people are shocked and should be, still, shocked by much of this evidence. Does any of it shock you, whenever this new evidence comes out?
TRUMP: I`m sorry to say it doesn`t. And I think it`s a sad commentary on how Donald, during the Republican nomination process, during his administration, was covered, that people still don`t quite understand the depths to which he would sink, the lengths to which he would go in order to make sure that he gets his way, no matter how illegitimately.
And the thing is, during that day, during those moments of utter and abject terror that Pence and everybody in that building was going through, Donald was directly responsible for it, first of all.
And secondly, he was actively agitating for it, because he knew at some point, the only way for him to get what he wanted was for the worst possible events to unfold in the Capitol.
[22:39:37]
O`DONNELL: So, during the attack, while it was very clear the vice president was in danger and Donald Trump knew the vice president was in danger, he tweeted, “Mike Pence didn`t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country and our constitution, giving states a chance to certify a corrected set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones, which they were asked to previously certify. U.S.A. demands the truth.”
Let`s look at the video about how the White House staff reacted to that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS HODGSON,FORMER PENCE DIRECTOR OF LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS: The noise from the rioters became audible, at which point we`ve recognized that maybe they have gotten into the building.
Then, President Trump tweeted, “Mike Pence didn`t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country and our constitution.”
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: And some of the White House staff, they were actually shocked by that at that time. They still have the capacity to be shocked about what that man could do.
TRUMP: It`s understandable, Lawrence. Because we are talking about people who wanted to think, if not the best of him, they wanted to believe that even he had limits. And this was lightyears beyond anything he had done, at least to people in his orbit.
I mean he had no trouble, of course, with putting up a Muslim ban, or putting children in cages. But when it came to his own people, he probably didn`t go as far as he ultimately did.
So, yes, I guess they were shocked by the fact that he finally crossed that line. In fact, one person said that when he most needed to be a moderating influence, he put gasoline on the fire.
I think we need to be more explicit. What he was doing was handing down a death sentence.
O`DONNELL: So Chris Hayes raised this issue in the first hour of our coverage tonight, about that tweet. When that tweet goes out, Donald Trump knows that Mike Pence is in danger. And he is sending out a tweet that he has to know can only increase the danger, the physical danger, the life- threatening danger to Mike Pence.
TRUMP: Yes. And that was deliberate. And it was because, again once Mike Pence made it clear to Donald that he was not going to go along with the plan, that he was for once going to stand up and do the right thing, even after not wanting to for a very long time, Donald realized the only recourse he had was to get the mob. To get those violent insurrectionists to do what he wanted them to do, in order to put a stop to the electoral college count and delay the vote or give him an opportunity to declare martial law — Mike Pence be damned.
O`DONNELL: Yes. And what Rudy Giuliani was doing during the delay, while the count was shut down, was actually trying to lobby members of Congress to join this revolt against the electoral college count.
So if you had given him a couple of days by injuring Mike Pence, they would have welcomed it.
TRUMP: They would have welcomed it. And I think what`s one of the most chilling things of all is that the normalization of what Donald had done, the revisionist history began almost immediately, when over 140 members of Congress still, despite everything that they have lived through and everything they knew had happened, still voted against proceeding with the calling the results of the free and fair election.
O`DONNELL: Mary Trump, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Really appreciate it.
TRUMP: Thank you, Lawrence.
O`DONNELL: And coming up, Clarence Thomas`s wife says she is willing to talk with the January 6 committee but she hasn`t told the committee that yet. That is next with presidential historian Michael Beschloss and Dahlia Lithwick.
[22:43:48]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: No wife or husband of a Supreme Court justice has engaged in public political activism the way Clarence Thomas` wife has done to the point where she may have broken the law.
We now know from her texts to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, which came public weeks ago, that she was urging everyone in the White House including Donald Trump, to break the law, to commit crimes to overturn the presidential election.
We now know she engaged in inter-state communications sending emails to Republican legislatures in Arizona, urging them to illegally overturn the results of the presidential election in Arizona.
Clarence Thomas is one of the Supreme Court justices who John Eastman believed would rule in favor of vice president Mike Pence rejecting electoral votes on January 6.
Why did he think that about Clarence Thomas? We now know that John Eastman was exchanging emails with Virginia Thomas. No one in the history of the Supreme Court, no Supreme Court justice and no spouse of a Supreme Court justice has ever been suspected of anything as bad as what we already know Virginia Thomas actually did.
[22:49:42]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SENATOR SHELDON WHITEHOUSE (D-RI): And the fact that Justice Roberts will go to DefCon one, and call in the marshals and declare an investigation, and say the court`s been betrayed, because a document leaked. And then, do absolutely nothing on this set of facts, is another very, very unfortunate situation for the court.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Joining us now, NBC News presidential historian Michael Beschloss and Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor and legal correspondent for Slate, and host of the podcast “Amicus”. She`s also an MSNBC law and politics analyst.
And Dahlia, let me just begin with you, because this would be the story every night for the last few weeks in a universe where we could control how many giant stories we have going at once.
And so, I didn`t want to leave our coverage tonight especially with Ginni Thomas linked now to the committee with their request that she testify without getting to this. What is your reaction to the way this story has developed with increasing evidence, right up until today, of Ginni Thomas` involvement?
DAHLIA LITHWICK, MSNBC LAW AND POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I think under your question Lawrence is how have we normalized this rank insanity. And I think the answer is simply Ginni and Clarence Thomas and the way in which they have had this kind of very, very deeply enmeshed marriage, but also political but also legal intervention in the kind of constitutional life of the country is something that we just accept. We all just accept it.
And so is this more or less shocking than the text to Mark Meadows. Is it more or less shocking than the emails to Arizona election officials? I mean John Eastman did not come out of today looking great, but I think in a strange way, both because we accept the fiction that we`re told that the court is untouchable, and because we`ve just gotten used to this story, (INAUDIBLE) it`s the way it ought to be.
O`DONNELL: Michael, we certainly have never seen a more publicly corrupted Supreme Court justice than Clarence Thomas, in that he actually ruled on a case about communications that could involve his wife`s communications, perhaps, knowing that his wife was in constant communication with Mark Meadows.
MICHAEL BESCHLOSS, NBC NEWS PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: You are totally right, Lawrence. Ginni Thomas, I`m sad to say, is an influence peddler. Do you think anyone would return her calls if she was not married to an incumbent justice of the Supreme Court? Do you think Donald Trump would have given her audiences, if she were not married to Clarence Thomas, and had access to all sorts of private information, about what was going on secretly on the Supreme Court?
That`s what those text that you`re talking about suggest, which is that she talked to people. She said, you know, I had some idea of what might happen, if something came to the Supreme Court.
Who told her that? We presume it was her husband. We do not know. If she`s going to testify before the January 6 Committee in the House, which I totally applaud if this is for real, she can`t take marital privilege and say, I`m not going to say a word about anything that my husband said to me or I said to him. She has got to tell everything for us to air this.
O`DONNELL: And Dahlia, one of her texts to Mark Meadows, she said about trying to overturn the election results, there are no rules in war. It`s hard to think of a more criminal kind of statement that you could make in that situation.
LITHWICK: I am being clearly — it is absolutely and pretty clear that she was all in for the project of setting aside the election results, because as she said in those texts to Mark Meadows, the Biden family needed to be tried on barges outside of Guantanamo. I mean, in her worldview, which is the kind of creepy QAnon conspiracy theory worldview, Biden was somehow so corrupt that anything — anything was justified.
But I think the deeper issue is that knowing about those texts, knowing about her involvement, Clarence Thomas continued to (INAUDIBLE) on cases that had to do with this election. And that`s a real issue.
Her conduct is not in his control. What is in his control is that he, I think, had a vested interest in the outcome of those cases, didn`t disclose it, and still continues to not recuse.
O`DONNELL: Michael, you know the history of vice presidents in public disagreement with their presidents better than I do. But I know it enough. I know it enough to know that there have been many public disagreements between vice presidents and presidents in our history for issues much smaller than the president asking the vice president to commit a crime.
[22:54:57]
O`DONNELL: And here is Mike Pence, staying absolutely silent for over a month when Donald Trump is publicly insisting that Mike Pence has a power on January 6 that he does not have.
BESCHLOSS: Right.
All of our friends watching us tonight, please, do not canonize Mike Pence. At the last second, he did the right thing. But before that, for four years, he lionized and sucked up to Donald Trump, licensed him in all sorts of offenses against democracy, encouraged him to do the kind of things that led to the insurrection on January 6.
And until the 6th of January, he was a silent accessory to a president who was running a diabolical plot to fix the 2020 election against the will of the voters. No president in history has ever done that before. It almost cost us our democracy.
O`DONNELL: Michael Beschloss, Dahlia Lithwick, thank you both for joining our coverage tonight. Really appreciate it.
BESCHLOSS: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: Thank you. We`ll be right back.
[22:55:58]
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O`DONNELL: We are a few seconds over out of time.
“THE 11TH HOUR WITH STEPHANIE RUHLE” starts now.