Democratic Rep. Raskin Describes Nightmare Scenario If Trump Had Pence’s Support on 1/6: He Probably Would’ve ‘Imposed Martial Law’

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) described to an exasperated Chris Hayes just how sideways the election certification on January 6 could have gone had then-Vice President Mike Pence not performed his constitutional duty that day.

“We got very lucky with Mike Pence,” said Raskin.

To win a presidential election, the Constitution requires that the winning candidate receives a majority of electoral votes – 271 at present. If no candidate notches a majority, the House of Representatives then votes for president, not individually, but with each state delegation having one vote. At the time of the election certification on January 6, Republicans were in the majority of 27 state delegations to the House.

Raskin explained how sticky things could have gotten if the rioters who stormed the Capitol to try to overturn the election had their way:

All they wanted Pence to do was to rebuff the electors coming in from Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania, lowering Biden’s total to below 270, kicking the presidential contest into a contingent election [in the House]. And there they wanted it because we vote not one member, one vote, but one state, one vote. And if they’d been able to do that, which would not have been really that much if you look at the different things Mike Pence did over the prior four years for Trump, they would have won it with 27 states to 22 for the Democrats and one tied. And at that point he probably would’ve followed the advice of Michael Flynn and imposed martial law and a state of siege, and this would’ve been the Reichstag moment.

Hayes expressed disbelief at such a constitutional crisis.

“If Pence had gotten up there that day and [said], ‘I’m rejecting them,’ there’s no recourse!” exclaimed Hayes. “They would just steal it! I mean that’s the craziest thing, and I don’t want to give Michael Pence, who’s, you know, debased himself in a million ways, too much credit here, but like, that’s what I’m hearing from you and that’s my understanding as well, which is a kind of stomach-dropping realization to come to.”

Watch above via MSNBC.

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