Mike Pence defends RNC resolution declaring January 6th insurrection as 'legitimate political discourse'

Former Vice President Mike Pence on Thursday defended the Republican National Committee’s February 4th resolution that censured United States Representatives Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Illinois) and designated the January 6th, 2021 Capitol insurrection as “legitimate political discourse.”

Cheney and Kinzinger are the only two GOP lawmakers serving on the House Select Committee tasked with investigating the deadly attack.

Speaking at a College Republicans event at Stanford University as reported by The Washington Post, Pence said that the RNC was not “talking about people that engaged in violence against persons or property that day.” Rather, the diktat was meant to stand up for “a whole range of people that have been set upon” by the bipartisan congressional panel.

“I just don’t know too many people around the country, including my friends at the RNC, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, who have any different view than it was a tragic day, that the people that ransacked the Capitol were wrong and should be held to account in the law,” Pence said. “And I think they made a very clear statement, after the fact, that said, ‘We were talking about what’s happening in Washington today, with the January 6th committee’ … and I believe them. They’re good people, and I believe that’s what they meant.”

The RNC has also denied that it is siding with the violent mob that stormed the Capitol at the behest of then-President Donald Trump while chanting “hang Mike Pence” and hunting House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) for assassination.

In the days leading up to and including January 6th, Trump and his clown car of jingoist lawyers had been pressuring Pence into throwing out the results of the 2020 election, which Trump and Pence lost in a landslide.

After consulting with ex-Vice President Dan Quayle, Pence ultimately refused to cooperate with the coup and performed his ceremonial obligation of tallying and certifying President-Elect Joe Biden’s 332-206 victory in the Electoral College.

“The Constitution was quite clear on that tragic day in January,” Pence said on Thursday. “I knew what my duty was. And I kept my oath even though it hurt. And we moved the nation forward. And I don’t know if the president and I will ever see eye to eye on that. I really don’t.”

Nevertheless, Pence's endorsement of and excuses for the RNC's controversial decree has sparked scorn and confusion among politicos.