Rubio says ‘vice presidents can’t simply decide not to certify an election’

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) on Sunday said “vice presidents can’t simply decide not to certify an election,” breaking with former President Trump after he suggested that then-Vice President Mike Pence had the ability to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Asked by moderator Margaret Brennan on CBS’s “Face the Nation” if he agreed with Pence — who on Friday said he had “no right to overturn the election” — Rubio said that after examining the matter, he concluded that vice presidents do not have the power to not certify an election.

“Well, if President Trump runs for reelection, I believe he would defeat Joe Biden, and I don’t want Kamala Harris to have the power as vice president to overturn that election, and … that’s the same thing that I concluded back in January of 2021,” Rubio said.

“You know, when that issue was raised, I looked at it, had analyzed it and came to the same conclusion that vice presidents can’t simply decide not to certify an election,” he added.

Florida GOP @SenRubioPress tells @margbrennan he agrees with Mike Pence that the VP “can’t simply decide not to certify an election” but avoids saying that former President Trump is wrong for saying so. pic.twitter.com/u16D9Etzus

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) February 6, 2022

Pressed by Brennan on if he believes Trump was wrong, Rubio reiterated, “I just don’t think a vice president has that power because if the vice president has that power, Donald Trump would defeat Joe Biden in … two years, and then Kamala Harris can decide not to overturn the election.”

“I don’t want to wind up there,” he added.

Pence turned heads on Friday when he sharply rebuked Trump for suggesting that he had the ability to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in January 2021.

During a Federalist Society event in Florida, Pence said the idea was “un-American.”

“The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone. Frankly, there is almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president,” Pence said.

“Under the Constitution, I had no right to change the outcome of our election. And Kamala Harris will have no right to overturn the election when we beat them in 2024,” he added.

Last weekend, Trump said he wanted his vice president to overturn the results of the election.

–Updated at 1:17 p.m.