WASHINGTON, 4 Feb (CGTN) -- Former U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said Friday that he had no right to overturn the 2020 election and former President Donald Trump was wrong to claim he could have done so.

Pence dismissed Trump's assertion he could have blocked Democrat Joe Biden's victory when he presided over the January 6, 2021 certification by Congress of the presidential election results.

"President Trump is wrong. I had no right to overturn the election," Pence said. "The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone.

"Under the Constitution, I had no right to change the outcome of our election."

After losing his re-election bid, Trump, as Republican president and candidate, in a bid to stay in office, pressured Pence to block congressional certification of the results. But Pence, a Republican from Indiana, opted not to do so.

Trump has often disparaged Pence since then, and on Sunday issued a fresh statement saying the former vice president could have "overturned" the election.

'Dark day'

While Pence was presiding over the certification, a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in a failed bid to stop the certification. Pence and U.S. lawmakers inside the Capitol fled from the rioters.

In his speech on Friday, Pence called January 6 a "dark day."

His comments stand in contrast to the Republican Party, which on Friday censured Republican U.S. Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for joining a House of Representatives select committee investigating the January 6 attack. The party said the Democrat-led inquiry was persecuting "ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse."

Republicans aligned with Trump have made the false election claims a key part of their campaigns heading into the November 2022 midterm elections in which the party is seeking to win back control of Congress from the Democrats. Around 55 percent of Republicans nationally think the 2020 election was stolen, according to Reuters/Ipsos polls.

Trump, who continues to have a strong grip over the party even out of office for more than a year, has hinted he could run for president again in 2024.

At a rally in Texas last Saturday, he said that if he were to win in 2024, he would pardon people charged with criminal offenses in connection with the January 6 riot.

In a speech moments before the January 6 attack, Trump repeated his false claims that the election was stolen through widespread voting fraud. He called on Pence to "do the right thing" and block certification of the election results, while urging his supporters to go to the Capitol to "stop the steal."

"All Vice President Pence has to do is send it back to the states to recertify and we become president and you are the happiest people," Trump told his supporters during the speech.

Later, some of the rioters at the Capitol chanted "Hang Mike Pence" and some set up a makeshift gallows.