Karen Pence ‘never felt afraid’ on Jan. 6: ABC News exclusive

On Jan. 6, 2021, when then-second woman Karen Pence drew the curtains of the vp’s ceremonial place of job on Capitol Hill, shielding her circle of relatives from the unfolding assault moments after their evacuation from the Senate chamber, she says she by no means feared for her lifestyles.

“Never,” Karen Pence instructed ABC News Live Prime Anchor Linsey Davis in a brand new interview, marking a few of her first public feedback on the day. “I just was discussing this with someone here in Iowa a few minutes ago, I never felt afraid.”

“I really felt like we just had such a peace and God’s presence,” she mentioned throughout the interview — phase one in every of which airs Monday evening on ABC News Live Prime at 7 p.m., 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET. “And just a sense of purpose and determination that I don’t think any of us in the whole group – all the staff and everyone with us — I don’t think any of us felt fear. I think we felt like a sense of resolve.”

Asked particularly via Davis about final the curtains, a second cemented in historical past via the previous vp’s photographer, the previous moment woman pinned the transfer on “conditioning” from years in public lifestyles.

“I think once you become, you know, second lady, life changed a lot for us. In fact, during the transition, we rented a home near D.C. And I remember walking in that home the first day — and Secret Service had put a butcher block paper, you know, all over the windows — and you couldn’t even see outside,” she mentioned.

“And every time we traveled, they would have bulletproof glass in every hotel room. So it’s a conditioning thing that I just knew. Whenever you’re in a situation where someone might be able to shoot through the window, just close the drapes,” she endured. “That was my thinking at the time was like, ‘Wait a minute. Things are starting to happen out there. Let’s close the drapes.'”

“You say things were starting to happen,” Davis adopted up. “But at what point did you realize my family could be in danger?”

“Well, the Secret Service are phenomenal men and women,” she spoke back. “And they made it clear to us right away that, you know, there might be a point where we would need to move to a different location.

“And so that was pretty clear to us from the very beginning because they had come and gotten us out of the Senate chambers and taken us back to Mike’s office and in the Senate. So, it was clear pretty early on that we might need to vacate that room and go somewhere else,” she added.

In his memoir released last November, “So Help Me God,” the former vice president similarly described feeling grounded by God when they were evacuated from the Senate chamber with their daughter Charlotte.

“We stood in combination in that cramped place of job and watched the mayhem unfolding inside of and across the Capitol on a small tv set. The scenes had been alarming,” Pence wrote. “I’ve frequently instructed our 3 kids that the most secure position on this planet is to be within the middle of God’s will. I knew in my center that we had been the place we had been meant to be, doing what we had been meant to be doing. I felt get to the bottom of and at peace knowledgeable via my upbringing in Indiana, my religion, my circle of relatives, a life-time of carrier and lifetime love of the Constitution.”

“Responding to a muffled roar within the distance, my spouse closed the drapes over the massive home windows going through outdoor to the north, as our lead Secret Service agent returned to make yet another pressing plea for us to depart,” he continued. “I pointed my finger at his chest and mentioned, ‘You’re now not listening to me. I’m now not leaving.'”

Not long after the photo was snapped, the Pences were rushed below the Capitol complex to a loading dock — where the vice president then refused to get in the car with the Secret Service.

“It wasn’t my first rodeo,” Pence wrote in his book. “I simply knew that if I were given into the auto and that 200-pound door close, any individual was once going to inform the driving force to get us out of the development.”

Karen and Charlotte Pence stayed at the Capitol until the early morning hours of Jan. 7, 2021, when the gavel finally fell, and President Joe Biden’s victory was affirmed. Noting this fact, Pence has called himself “actually blessed.”

When he launched his campaign for president in June, Pence said it came after prayer and deep reflection with his family — and two and half years after Trump “demanded” he choose him over the Constitution.

“As I’ve mentioned time and again, on that fateful day, President Trump’s phrases had been reckless. They endangered my circle of relatives and everybody on the Capitol,” he said on June 8, 2023, in Iowa. “But the American other folks deserve to grasp that on that day, President Trump additionally demanded that I choose from him and the Constitution. Now, electorate might be confronted with the similar selection: I selected the Constitution, and I at all times will.”

Pence has since leaned into his criticism as Trump faces criminal charges around alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Pence’s campaign says it received 7,400 donations the day after Jack Smith’s latest indictment, which mentioned the former vice president’s role more than 100 times, came down.

As Pence lays out his differences with Trump, which he says extend beyond Jan. 6, Karen is never far.

He fondly introduces her on the stump as “the highest-ranking authentic within the room: a Marine Corps mother, a lifelong schoolteacher, completed artist, bestselling creator and the most efficient moment woman within the United States of America has ever had.”

More than 38 years after meeting at church in Indiana, the Pence couple’s faith continues to guide their marriage, and offered guidance on Jan. 6, like any other day.

More of former second lady Karen Pence’s interview will be running this September as part of ABC News Live Prime’s “working associates” sequence highlighting the spouses of presidential applicants.