Vice President Pence will not support GOP congressional effort to contest electoral votes

Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday he will lacks the constitutional authority to reject the electoral votes in favor of Democrat Joe Biden as president, rejecting President Trump's recent repeated urgings to stop the process on Capitol Hill.

"The Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not,” Pence, who is presiding over the joint session of Congress, purportedly says in the letter.

Pence's statement came just as Trump was speaking to a crowd at a rally in Washington, D.C., encouraging his vice president to "stand up for the good of our Constitution."

"Mike Pence, I hope you’re gonna stand up for the good of our Constitution and for the good of our country, and if you’re not I’m gonna be very disappointed in you, I will tell you right now," said the president to a large crowd near the Capitol.