George Conway, an attorney and former leading member of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, criticized former Vice President Mike Pence for “downplaying” the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol during his speech Thursday night at a GOP event in New Hampshire.
Conway, the husband of former Trump White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, said Pence downplayed the “most significant disagreement you would ever possibly have.”
GEORGE CONWAY: SHUT DOWN LINCOLN PROJECT ‘ABSENT FULL DISCLOSURE OF ITS FINANCES’
“He’s worried about harming himself by standing up for democracy,” Conway added during a Friday interview with CNN’s John Berman and Brianna Keilar.
The attorney also accused Trump of “inciting an insurrection” on Capitol Hill earlier this year when he called his supporters to Washington, D.C., to attend a “Stop the Steal” rally outside the White House in opposition to Congress’s efforts to certify the 2020 election that took place on the same day as the Capitol riot.
When Pence delivered a speech at the Lincoln-Reagan Dinner, sponsored by the Hillsborough County Republican Committee in New Hampshire, on Thursday, he embraced Trump’s “Make America Great Again” agenda and said he and his former boss have spoken multiple times since leaving office. But Pence also acknowledged, “I don’t know if we will ever see eye to eye on that day,” recounting his sentiments that “Jan. 6 was a dark day in the history of the United States of America.”
On the day of the riot, Pence, a former governor of Indiana and U.S. congressman, was in the room presiding over Congress’s count of electoral votes after he made headlines for his refusal to go along with Trump’s push to overturn the results. Pence was evacuated to a secure location, as some of the rioters threatened his life. He later broke with Trump again in choosing to attend Joe Biden’s inauguration while Trump skipped out on the festivities.
Conway said Pence lived up to his role in the certification of Biden’s 2020 victory but admonished his speech as “depressing and stunning,” adding, “It’s just not something where you can just say, ‘Well, we don’t quite see eye to eye.’ … It’s just a remarkable attempt to downplay the significance of what happened.”
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Trump, 74, spoke at a GOP convention in North Carolina over the weekend and has only hinted at being interested in another run for the White House in 2024. Even though he hasn’t announced a decision yet, Trump told Fox Business on Monday he would consider ditching Pence for someone like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as a running mate.
Pence’s speech last week in an early primary state fueled speculation that he, too, might be considering his own 2024 presidential run.
