2024 GOP candidates take sides as Trump indicted over 2020 election actions

Some Republican contenders for the 2024 presidential nomination took former President Donald Trump to task for his third indictment in four months — this time over his effort to overturn the 2020 election — while others blasted the Justice Department’s actions.

Former Vice President Mike Pence took a strong stance after the four-count indictment accusing his former boss of making “knowingly false” claims of voter fraud in a desperate bid to stay in power.

“Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States,” Pence tweeted.

“Our country is more important than one man. Our Constitution is more important than any one man’s career,” he added in another post.

“On January 6th, Former President Trump demanded that I choose between him and the Constitution. I chose the Constitution and I always will.”

Chris Christie, Trump’s one-time ally who has become one of his biggest hecklers in the crowded GOP field, called the latest charges “a stain on our country’s history.”

“The events around the White House from election night forward are a stain on our country’s history & a disgrace to the people who participated,” the former New Jersey governor tweeted.

“This disgrace falls the most on Donald Trump. He swore an oath to the Constitution, violated his oath & brought shame to his presidency.

GOP longshot, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, took a similar tone in criticizing Trump over the fresh federal charges.

“I have always said that Donald Trump is morally responsible for the attack on our democracy,” he tweeted. “Now, with today’s indictment, our system of Justice will determine whether he is criminally responsible.”

Other candidates, however, were quick to take shots at the Department of Justice and other federal law enforcement agencies.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is second to Trump in polling among GOP candidates, vowed in a tweet to “end the weaponization of government, replace the FBI Director, and ensure a single standard of justice for all Americans.”

He said he’s only seen reports about the case against Trump and has not read the indictment. Still, he said it was important to enact reforms that would include Americans having the ability to move cases from Washington, DC, to their home districts.

“Washington, DC is a ‘swamp’ and it is unfair to have to stand trial before a jury that is reflective of the swamp mentality,” he wrote. “One of the reasons our country is in decline is the politicization of the rule of law. No more excuses — I will end the weaponization of the federal government.”

South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott expressed his concern about Biden’s Justice Department and “its immense power used against political opponents.”

“What we see today are two different tracks of justice. One for political opponents and another for the son of the current president,” Scott tweeted in reference to Hunter Biden. “We’re watching Biden’s DOJ continue to hunt Republicans, while protecting Democrats.”

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy also took a strong stance against the feds while defending Trump, who he vowed to pardon over this indictment if elected.

He then blamed censorship for the ugly scene that unraveled on Jan. 6.

“Donald Trump isn’t the cause of what happened on Jan 6,” he wrote in a lengthy tweet. “The real cause was systematic & pervasive censorship of citizens in the year leading up to it. If you tell people they can’t speak, that’s when they scream. If you tell people they can’t scream, that’s when they tear things down. If we fail to admit the truth, Jan 6 will just be a preview of far worse to come & I don’t want to see us get there.”

At the time of publication, candidate Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who served as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, has yet to take a side.

Trump has blasted the charges as politically motivated. He could face up to 55 years in prison if convicted on all charges.

He could still run for the White House in 2024 even if found guilty and is currently the frontrunner to face President Biden in the general election after losing to the Democrat in 2020.

Trump has also been indicted on federal charges tied to his storage of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago and in Manhattan over hush money payments during the 2016 campaign.