Donald Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, testified in court on Thursday as part of the investigation into attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 US presidential election, multiple US media reported.
The citizens’ panel responsible for hearing the Republican tenor met at 9:00 a.m. Thursday in Washington, CNN said in particular, citing people familiar with the matter.
In late March, a judge ordered Mike Pence to testify about conversations he had with Donald Trump before his supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Investigators, led by special prosecutor Jack Smith, are looking into Mr Trump’s role in the violence that erupted that day, as part of what would have been a broader attempt to stay in power after losing the presidential election against Joe Biden.
Mr. Pence was thus summoned to answer any questions from a federal grand jury on potential crimes committed by the former president.
In the United States, a grand jury is a panel of citizens with broad investigative powers, including voting to recommend an indictment.
Donald Trump had tried to prevent any testimony from his former vice-president before this grand jury, but a federal appeals court had dismissed his request on Wednesday.
Donald Trump is seeking a new term in 2024 and Mike Pence could be among those who will challenge him for the Republican nomination.
The former vice president said in March that history would hold Donald Trump “responsible” for his role in the assault on the Capitol.
“I had no right to cancel [le résultat de] the election. And his reckless words endangered my family and everyone in the Capitol that day,” he said.
Donald Trump is at the center of several other investigations.
At the end of March, he became the first president in the history of the United States to be indicted, in the case of buying the silence of a pornographic actress in 2016.
A Georgia state prosecutor has also been investigating since 2021 “attempts to influence the electoral operations” of this southern state, won by a short head by Joe Biden in 2020.
Special Prosecutor Jack Smith is also investigating the case of the White House archives, Donald Trump being accused of having taken away entire boxes of documents at the end of his presidency. However, a 1978 law obliges all American presidents to transmit all of their e-mails, letters and other working documents to the National Archives.