Pilate had a nuanced view of what Truth is.
From a historian view of Governor Pilate. He wasn’t elected...he was appointed. The Rome folks brought him in....not the locals. When the local cops (best description for the thugs who made the arrest) brought Jesus in...Pilate eventually made the “Rome decision” (which he couldn’t violate their authority, even from that distance), but then he did a strange thing. Pilate had to write the proper title on the cross....so he, as governor, admitted he was dealing with the “king of the Jews”, period. The local authorities were highly upset....wanting the description to be “someone who says he is the King of the Jews”. Pilate never backed down on the title.
The interesting thing here is that history normally would have recorded very little on Pilate and he would have been mostly forgotten by the masses of society, the mainstream media, and even most Deacons....except he had to pass judgment over one individual that remains in the highest levels of history. When people go back to armchair quarterbacking....this is the one episode that continues to be brought up, and can never be tossed as a simple mistake.