In a memo not made public until now, then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows emailed to Vice President Mike Pence’s top aide, on New Year’s Eve, a detailed plan for undoing President Joe Biden’s election victory, ABC News’ Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl reports.
Ellis, in the memo, outlined a multi-step strategy: On Jan. 6, the day Congress was to certify the 2020 election results, Pence was to send back the electoral votes from six battleground states that Trump falsely claimed he had won.
The memo said that Pence would give the states a deadline of “7pm eastern standard time on January 15th” to send back a new set of votes, according to Karl.
Then, Ellis wrote, if any state legislature missed that deadline, “no electoral votes can be opened and counted from that state.”
Such a scenario would leave neither Biden nor Trump with a majority of votes, Ellis wrote, which would mean “Congress shall vote by state delegation” — which, Ellis said, would in turn lead to Trump being declared the winner due to Republicans controlling the majority of state delegations with 26.
The day after Meadows sent Ellis’ memo to Pence’s aide, on Jan. 1, Trump aide John McEntee sent another memo to Pence’s chief of staff, Marc Short, titled, “Jefferson used his position as VP to win.”ADVERTISING
Although McEntee’s memo was historically incorrect, Karl says, his message was clear: Jefferson took advantage of his position, and Pence must do the same.
What followed during that first week of January was an effort by Trump, both personally and publicly, to push his vice president to take away Biden’s victory.MORE: Read the memo from Trump aide’s office making the case to fire Defense Secretary Mark Esper
“I hope Mike Pence comes through for us,” Trump said at a roaring Georgia rally on Jan. 4, a day before Republicans would also lose their Senate majority. “I have to tell you I hope that our great vice president comes through for us. He’s a great guy. Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him quite as much.”
At a March 18 sit-down interview with Trump for the upcoming book, Karl asked the former president about a report from The New York Times that on the morning of Jan. 6, Trump pressured Pence with a crude phone call, reportedly telling his vice president, “You can be a patriot or you can be a p****.”
“I wouldn’t dispute it,” Trump said to Karl.
“Really?” Karl responded.
“I wouldn’t dispute it,” Trump repeated.
It wasn’t just Eastman musing in a single memo. It was a full-fledged plan.
I have to wonder if Pence regrets not going with it. He would certainly be more popular with the MAGA base if he had.