Trump lawyer John Lauro pushes back on criticism for making statement about Jan. 6 case in Fox News interview

John Lauro, a lawyer for former President Trump, has come under fire for acknowledging in a TV interview that Trump tried to delay Congress from certifying the 2020 election on Jan. 6, 2021, a key portion of special counsel Jack Smith’s case.

Lauro said Thursday that Trump pushed then-Vice President Mike Pence to delay Congress from counting the electoral votes on the bogus pretext that some states needed more time to investigate supposed claims of fraud.

“What President Trump said is: ‘Let’s go with option D,’” Lauro said on Fox News. “Let’s just halt, let’s just pause the voting and allow the state legislatures to take one last look and make a determination as to whether or not the elections were handled fairly.”

Just a couple of hours after Trump’s arraignment in a federal court, Lauro claimed Trump merely “wanted to get to the truth” by blocking Congress from certifying Biden’s win.

“He desperately wanted to get to what happened during the 2020 cycle. He did it in the courtroom. He did it in lobbying legislatures,” Lauro said. “That’s all First Amendment.”

Lauro portrayed the innocent-sounding “Option D” as a perfectly normal way of fighting an election dispute.

In the indictment , Smith frames the Trump push as part of an unprecedented effort to thwart the Constitution, which does not permit any such role for state legislatures or anyone else after their presidential election results have been certified by early December.

Smith alleges that Trump and an unindicted co-conspirator identified aslaw professor John Eastman held a meeting with Pence at which Trump demanded that the veep “reject or send to the states Biden’s legitimate electoral votes, rather than count them.”

Smith portrays that meeting as key evidence of a plot to obstruct an official proceeding.

Legal analysts panned Lauro for confirming a portion of the prosecution’s case even though Trump publicly called on Pence to stop the vote.

“An admission, not a defense,” tweeted Andrew Weissmann, a former federal prosecutor on special counsel Robert Mueller’s team.

“Sounds like a coup,” added Joyce White Vance, a former U.S. Attorney.

Lauro, in an interview with the Daily News, said his critics were out of line.

“These legal commentators made false and erroneous comments about the existence of any admission,” Lauro said. “If they had read the Ellipse speech, they would have known I was simply commenting on evidence that was already in the public record when President Trump made the request to Vice President Pence to pause the voting.”

Lauro was referencing what Trump said about delaying the certification during his fiery Jan. 6 speech.

“The request to pause the vote was in the Ellipse speech and part of the Eastman memo,” said Lauro.

Trump pleaded not guilty and was freed without bond on four counts including conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and deprivation of rights.

The indictment details an alleged multi-pronged plot Trump and his associates implemented to keep himself in office after losing the 2020 election to President Biden.

The scheme included bogus claims of voter fraud, ginning up slates of pro-Trump electors in states he actually lost and bullying Pence into delaying the certification of Biden’s win on Jan. 6.

When all those plans failed, Trump urged his supporters to “fight like hell” to keep him in power and thousands of them marched on the Capitol to physically block Congress from acting as the Constitution demands.

Trump faces an Aug. 28 hearing at which U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan will set a trial date.

Trump’s defense team hopes to delay the case as long as possible or until after the 2024 election, when Trump hopes to win back the White House.

Smith has vowed to seek a “speedy trial.” He has until Aug. 10 to file papers requesting a trial date and informing the judge how long he expects it would last.

This story has been updated.