Topline
Former President Donald Trump’s emergency plea to block former Vice President Mike Pence’s testimony before a grand jury investigating efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential elections and the January 6 riots was denied by a federal appeals court Wednesday, in the latest legal blow to the former president who is at the center of multiple investigations.
Former US Vice President Mike Pence speaks about “Saving America from the Woke Left,” at the … [+]
Key Facts
The verdict was issued by a three-judge panel at the D.C. Circuit federal appeals court in a sealed ruling.
The panel was made up of one Trump appointee and two Obama appointees.
The former president and his aides are yet to comment on the ruling, and it is unclear if they plan to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court or a full bench of the D.C. Circuit Court.
Pence and his aides have previously indicated that he is prepared to testify before the jury “as required by law.”
What To Watch For
It is unclear as to when the former vice president will be asked to testify before the grand jury. Pence had initially challenged the subpoena and a judge partially upheld Pence’s argument that some of his conversations were protected under the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause as he presided over Congress on January 6. This will allow Pence to limit his testimony to conversations leading up to January 6, while protecting the conversations he had on the day of the riot itself. Speaking about his testimony on CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday, Pence said: “We’ll obey the law, we’ll tell the truth and the story that I’ve been telling the American people all across the country, the story that I wrote in the pages of my memoir, that’ll- that’ll be what I tell in that setting as well.”
What We Don’t Know
The ruling comes at a time when Pence is expected to make a decision about entering the race for the Republican nomination for the 2024 election. The former vice president has indicated multiple times that he is considering a run, but is yet to outright announce any plans. On Sunday, Pence told CBS that anyone who is serious about running “would need to be in this contest by June, and…if we have an announcement to make, it’ll be well before late June.” When asked which way he was leaning, Pence pointed to the fact that he was in Iowa—which will host the first major contest of the 2024 GOP race.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2023/04/27/appeals-court-rejects-trump-plea-to-block-pences-testimony-before-grand-jury/