Sofia Kinzinger presses Pence to be more truthful about Trump
Sofia Kinzinger, the former director of strategic media for then-Vice President Mike Pence, is pressing her former boss to be more truthful about former President Trump.
In an interview on "CNN This Morning" with Poppy Harlow, Kinzinger criticized Pence and said there are too many untruths still floating around about Trump and the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Kinzinger – who is married to former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), a former member of the Jan. 6 Select Committee – said it was especially personal for her when she hears Pence refer to the Jan. 6 Committee as a partisan witch hunt.
“I worked in campaigns. I know what it takes to strategically draft talking points. Because you’re trying to pursue voters. We’re not talking about policies here, we’re talking about our democracy,” Kinzinger told Harlow in the Monday interview.
“Mike Pence, he knows us. He knows Adam very well, he knows me. We’re not Democrats and would definitely not allow Democrats to use us as political pawns. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger really exposed the truth when he was quiet,” Kinzinger said of Pence.
Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger were the two Republicans who served on the House Jan. 6 panel. They did so after then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) rejected two of then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy's (R-Calif.) GOP picks for the panel, arguing they were too close to Trump. Other Republicans in the House then refused to serve on the committtee.
“And, honestly, I would like to know what he thinks about Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney. Is he grateful for what they did?" Sofia Kinzinger said. "Because he’s confirming absolutely everything that he’s now brave enough to come up to the public and explain.”
Adam Kinzinger is now a senior political commentator on CNN.
Sofia Kinzinger said that she “absolutely” would have liked Pence to have spoken out sooner. “And not because I’m Adam’s wife and what we had to endure, but as an American. He was our number two.”
Pence, who is running against Trump for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, has repeatedly criticized the former president over his actions on Jan. 6, 2021. His criticisms have been tougher on the issue than several other GOP rivals to Trump.
Pence has also stepped up some of his public criticism since Trump was indicted and charged with four criminal counts related to his attempts to stay in power in the aftermath of the 2020 election.
Pence provided key testimony to the special counsel drafting the indictment, and Pence’s efforts to push back against Trump’s pressure for Pence to reject electoral votes on January 6, 2021 is detailed at length.
But Sofia Kinzinger said Pence in her view has not been as vocal as he could be.
“He now makes it sound like he’s been out there speaking about this a long time. Listen, we don’t forget. He was absent for a long time, and this is where, again, it becomes personal, because there were two that were willing to fight for that truth, his truth.
“The narrative out of the committee was that he acted heroically. I would like to know if he preferred that Jim Jordan was on the committee? Would that have been the narrative? I don’t know. So, yes, it’s very unfair and very disappointing,” Kinzinger said.
This story was updated at 10:36 a.m.