According to 2 individuals with knowledge of the situation, a federal judge has directed former Vice President Mike Pence to appear before a grand jury trying to investigate former President Donald J. Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election, effectively dismissing two distinct legal attempts by Mr. Pence and Mr. Trump to limit his testimony.
Judge James E. Boasberg’s rulings in Federal District Court in Washington on Monday were the latest setback to Mr. Trump’s legal team’s efforts to limit the context of queries that the prosecution can ask witness statements close to him during the separate investigations into his attempts to keep his authority after his election loss and his handling of secret information after he left office. Mr. Trump frequently pressured Mr. Pence in the weeks preceding the Capitol assault by a pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, 2021, to use his ceremonial role supervising the congressional count of Electoral College votes to reject or postpone the certification of his defeat.
Mike Pence Will Have To Testify In Court
Prosecutors have sought to compel Mike Pence to testify about Mr. Trump’s demands on him, which were carefully recorded by Mr. Pence’s aides in testimony last year to a House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 violence and what led up to it.
This month, Mr. Trump’s lawyers asked Judge Boasberg’s previous leader as chief judge for the trial, Beryl A. Howell, to limit Mike Pence’s testimony by trying to claim that some issues were off-limits due to executive privilege, which protects communications between the president and certain members of his administration. At the same time, Mr. Pence’s attorneys tried to limit his testimony, claiming that as Senate President, he was immune from legal examination by the executive branch, including the Justice Department, under the Constitution’s “speech or debate” provision. This clause is meant to safeguard the separation of powers.
