'OK, no': GOP lawmaker smacked down on CNN for trying to excuse Trump election theft plot

CNN's Pamela Brown on Thursday got into a heated exchange with Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) over former President Donald Trump's efforts to get former Vice President Mike Pence to throw out certified election results in 2020.

When asked about the recent court filing from special counsel Jack Smith outlining Trump's allegedly criminal efforts to illegally remain in power after losing the 2020 election, Waltz defended the former president's actions as legitimate.

"The president had his concerns," he said. "He pursued them in court, but he left before January 20th on his own accord."

Trump did leave the White House in 2021 but not before he incited a deadly riot at the United States Capitol in which his supporters broke into the building and sent lawmakers fleeing for their lives.

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Brown noted that Trump "pressured his vice president to overturn the will of the voters," a frame that Waltz angrily rejected.

"He pressured his vice president to take a view of a very vague law that Congress since stepped in and clarified," he said.

"OK, no," replied Brown.

"But we did!" insisted Waltz. "The Electoral Count Act, Pam! The Congress stepped in!"

"The Electoral Count Act did not allow the vice president to overturn the will of the people," Brown shot back.

Although the Electoral Count Act has been criticized for vagueness in some areas, no president before Trump had sought to have his own vice president unilaterally reject certified election results.

Had there really been such a precedent, it is highly likely that former Vice President Al Gore would have used it in 2000 when he won the popular vote but lost the tipping-point state of Florida to President George W. Bush by less than 1,000 votes.

Instead, Gore conceded the election and did not incite violent supporters to storm the Capitol on his behalf.

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