Appearing on five television networks Sunday morning, a lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump argued that his actions in the effort to overturn the 2020 election fell short of crimes and were merely “aspirational”.

The remarks from his lawyer, John F. Lauro, came as Trump was blanketing his social media platform, Truth Social, with posts suggesting that his legal team was going to seek the recusal of Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, the federal judge overseeing the case, and try to move his trial out of Washington.

With his client facing charges carrying decades in prison after a federal grand jury indicted Trump for his role in trying to overturn the election, his third criminal case this year, Lauro appeared in interviews to defend Trump, including against evidence that, as President, he pressured his vice-president, Mike Pence, to reject legitimate votes for Joseph R. Biden Jr. in favour of false electors pledged to Trump.

“What President Trump didn’t do is direct Vice-President Pence to do anything,” Lauro said on CNN’s State of the Union. “He asked him in an aspirational way.”

As Lauro made the rounds, Trump waged his own campaign on Truth Social.

“WOW, it’s finally happened! Liddle’ Mike Pence, a man who was about to be ousted as Governor Indiana until I came along and made him V.P., has gone to the Dark Side,” Trump wrote on Saturday.

A few days earlier, he mocked Pence, now a 2024 rival, for “attracting no crowds, enthusiasm or loyalty from people who, as a member of the Trump Administration, should be loving him”. Trump went on: “I never told a newly emboldened (not based on his 2% poll numbers!) Pence to put me above the Constitution, or that Mike was ‘too honest.’”

New York Times News Service