Mike Pence’s handwritten notes reveal that Donald Trump called him a “wimp” during their final phone call

27 October 2025

Former Vice President Mike Pence’s own day-planner entries from the morning of January 6, 2021 reveal a heated exchange with then-President Donald Trump, during which Trump reportedly told Pence he would “go down as a wimp” if he refused to intervene in the election certification.

The notes, now featured in journalist Jonathan Karl’s upcoming book Retribution: Donald Trump and the Campaign That Changed America, were initially obtained by Special Counsel Jack Smith as part of the Jan. 6 investigation. In them Pence writes both Trump’s words and his own responses, offering a real-time glimpse into the internal White House pressure leading up to the Capitol riot.

One page quotes Trump saying, “If you do that, I made a big mistake 5 years ago,” in reference to selecting Pence as his running mate. Pence’s rebuttal, scrawled in his own hand, reads: “It doesn’t take courage to break the law. It takes courage to uphold the law.”

Pence also noted that the then-President accused him of “listening to the wrong people,” suggesting Trump believed Pence had been misled into honoring his constitutional duty. The hour-long conversation occurred while thousands of Trump supporters gathered in Washington, D.C., and just hours before the infamous storming of the U.S. Capitol.

The significance of the timing and content of the call is stark: Pence was in the Capitol overseeing the certification of the 2020 election results, a process Trump repeatedly tried to derail. While Pence accepted his constitutional obligation, Trump’s language, as captured in the notes, conveyed contempt and frustration rather than camaraderie or support.

The notes also have legal and historical weight. They are being treated in some quarters as contemporaneous evidence of Trump’s efforts to pressure his vice-president, reinforcing the narrative of coercion and threat surrounding the events of that day.

For Pence, the documentation offers a personal record of his internal turmoil and decision-making under duress. For Trump, the implied insult reflects a deeper rift, one that has shaped his post-administration political standing and relationship with his former vice-president.

As Karl’s book hits shelves and the Jan. 6 story continues to be litigated in public, the appearance of these notes adds another piece to the puzzle of how that chaotic day unfolded inside and behind the cameras of the White House.