Later on NBC's "Meet the Press," Rep. Jamie Raskin, who sat on the House panel that investigated the Capitol riot, said Lauro’s argument was “deranged.”

Trump’s lawyer John Lauro argued that even if Trump committed a “technical violation of the Constitution,” it does not necessarily mean he broke any criminal laws regarding pressuring Pence to overturn the 2020 election results. Lauro claimed Trump believed he had won the election and was exercising his First Amendment rights to express that opinion. However, critics say Trump’s actions went beyond free speech and he conspired to defraud the public and nullify lawful votes. Former Attorney General William Barr said the charges are legitimate and Trump’s actions went far beyond expressing an opinion. Trump has said he will seek to have the judge assigned to his case recused and request a change of venue, alleging unfairness.

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    Lauro appeared to signal how he’d defend the former president in a trial that will stem from the four-count criminal indictment returned last week by a federal grand jury that had been examining Trump’s possible role in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot and his alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

    Pence elaborated on the subject Sunday, saying on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” that Trump, “from sometime in the middle of December” 2020 “began to be told that I had some authority to reject or return votes back to the states.”

    The indictment cited contemporaneous notes Pence took about meetings in which Trump pushed him to reject the Electoral College votes in multiple states.

    Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., a member of the Jan. 6 committee who was lead manager in Trump’s second impeachment trial, slammed Lauro’s argument as “deranged” and “a grievous constitutional defense" in a separate interview Sunday on “Meet the Press.”

    “He conspired to defraud the American people out of our right to an honest election by substituting the real legal process we have under federal and state law with counterfeit electors,” Raskin said.

    “There is no way I can get a fair trial with the judge ‘assigned’ to the ridiculous freedom of speech/fair elections case,” Trump wrote in an all-capitalized post on his Truth Social platform.