you re live in the cnn newsroom. i m jim acosta in washington. good evening. we re inching closer to what could be an historic week when donald trump is potentially indicted for trying to overturn the 2020 presidential. even the former president himself believes the indictment is coming. the question is when. it would be trump s third potential indictment and a game changer in the battle for the gop presidential nomination. but some of trump s republican challengers are shrugging off trump s role in the capitol attack. among those questioning the case, mike pence. here is the former vice president and his family being whisked away. you probably remember these images from january 6th as r rioters were chanting hang mike pence. here is what pence said to cnn earlier today. while his words were reckless, based on what i know, i m not yet convinced that they were criminal. president trump was wrong on that day, and he is still wrong,
president on january 6th. but he is not a very good criminal law expert. okay. he s focusing on the wrong thing. it s not donald trump s words on the ellipse that day that create the criminal liability, according to the target letter that jack smith has sent. donald trump oversaw starting in november of 2020 an alleged nationwide scheme to procure false election certificates. that has nothing to do with the words on january 6th. and then he squeezed mike pence to betray his duty on that day. again, that s irrespective of what donald trump did on the ellipse. and then finally, it s not the words of his speech so much. it s that 187 minutes of inaction. former president trump had a legal duty to act, and that s what gives rise to the charges for violating rights and privilege, civil rights charges.
i wrote a bipartisan model prosecution memo just before the target. i remember. letter came out. and experts of both parties say there seems to be a strong criminal case here against trump. and trump shared this ominous video on truth social. let s listen to this. if you do something bad to us, we are going to do things to you that have never been done before. now the audio of that comes from a few years back. and so we need to note this. but he did repost this on truth social. it came from other group apparently. but he reposted on truth social. it sounds as though he is issuing a not so veiled threat. could the judge, if is there a judge that s ultimately appointed in the january 6th case, if there is an indictment, we should say if, could the judge issue a gag order and say you can t continue to do this kind of incitement rhetoric? could happen. the first amendment provides a
at stake. and what s worse, the candidates who are running against him have no idea how to go against that. and to that point, olivia, your old boss, you worked for vice president mike pence. he says he is not so sure trump s actions on january 6th were criminal. let s watch. the president s words were reckless that day. i had no right to overturn the election. but while his words were reckless, based on what i know, i m not yet con finished they were criminal. criminal charges have everything to do with intent, what the president s state of mind was. and i don t honestly know what his intention was that day. olivia, as you know, they were saying hang mike pence that day. i guess that s not enough for the former president. yeah, i guess not. i think does he have amnesia about the lead-up to january 6th and what happened there? the amount of pressuring that trump did, the fact that they have interviewed all these people at the state level that faced intimidation by him, the
but section c, on instructing an official proceeding. you can t tell mike pence not to recognize the rightful winner, recognize me, trump said. that s a serious criminal allegation from the target letter. and then the third one, this civil rights conspiracy on the day of january 6th itself. pressuring pence and congress not to recognize the rightful winner. well, that is offense against the votes of $81 million americans who voted. and he was egging on the crowd. and there is video of people in the crowd saying oh, we just got a tweet from trump. yeah, this is probably the weakest portion of the former vice president s analysis. because at 2:24 p.m., former president trump tweeted when the insurrection was already going on. right. the violence was going on, inflaming and then of course we saw the vice president fleeing. so i think there is a powerful criminal case here.