Former U.S. Vice President Mike Pence has testified before a jury on the violent storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. For hours, Pence had been on Thursday as a witness in a federal court in the capital Washington to answer questions, as US media reported unanimously, citing informed circles. Nothing was known about the contents of the survey. The investigation is intended to clarify the role that Pence's former boss, ex-President Donald Trump, played in the events of that day. The investigation is being led by a special investigator appointed by the Ministry of Justice.

The testimony was preceded by a long legal battle. Pence had always rejected the demands of the investigators to testify in the case. On January 6, as vice president and thus automatically chairman of the Senate, he presided over the meeting at the Capitol at which Biden's election victory was to be officially confirmed and which was interrupted by the attack. Pence invoked a safeguard clause for debates in Congress to avoid questioning. Most recently, however, a judge had ordered that Pence had to testify.

The investigation into the January 6 attack is one of Trump's many legal problems. Only on Wednesday, the US author Jean Carroll had accused him of sex crimes in the mid-1990s in a civil lawsuit brought by her. In another case, involving hush money payments, charges were brought against Trump. In addition, Trump is being investigated for his handling of classified government documents. In the state of Georgia, the prosecutor is investigating Trump for possible attempted election interference.

Trump himself portrays the actions of law enforcement against him as politically motivated because he is running again as a Republican presidential candidate for the 2024 election.