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Two important events on Thursday could weigh on Mike Pence’s aspirations in the White House – and the former vice president will not appear at any of them.
In Washington, D.C., at a hearing by a House of Representatives committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, Pence’s top officials will discuss how they opposed Donald Trump’s demands for his vice president to reject the election results. Pence said publicly that Trump’s request was wrong, but he did not speak to the committee.
Meanwhile in Nashville, Christian conservatives will gather for the Coalition for Faith and Freedom conference, which is a traditional stop for emerging presidential candidates, especially for candidates rooted in the Pence movement. When Pence appeared at the band’s event last year, he was booed and booed with calls for a “traitor.”
Pence’s decision to miss both highlights his challenge as he is positioned to stand up to Trump for the Republican nomination in 2024. Councilors say the former vice president is defending his actions on Jan. 6, but does not want to be known for attacking Trump such as MP Tom Rice (RS.C.), who lost his primary election on Tuesday after voting for Trump’s impeachment, or MP Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), who is leading the most aggressive criticism of the committee on 6 January against the first president.
“The way he looks at him, he’s done his duty, there’s no need to talk about it anymore,” said Mark Short, Pence’s chief of staff, in an interview with The Washington Post. “He does not want to judge the past again. He believes that voters want to look ahead, not back.
Short said he did not believe Pence’s actions before and during Jan. 6 would be Pence’s political responsibility in the long run, although he said there were people who questioned Pence’s decision.
“There is a lot of admiration in certain circles, and there is a lot of admiration in certain circles. Let’s not talk about it, we love you for everything you did, but it’s uncomfortable for all of us,” Short said. “History has a way of arranging the truth, and I think more and more people will begin to appreciate what they did that day. I can’t tell you exactly when this is happening, but I think over time it’s in his favor.
But Thursday’s hearing could complicate that position, whether Pence likes it or not.
An aide to the commission said Wednesday that the hearing would be divided into four main parts: the emergence of the theory that Pence could unilaterally reject President Biden’s voters; how the theory was rejected by Pence and his advisers; the Pence pressure campaign led by the former president; and how this campaign directly contributed to the uprising and endangered Pence’s life.
The hearings have already highlighted tensions between Trump and Pence, as they did in prime time last week, when Cheney quoted unspecified testimony that Trump expressed support for the rebels, chanting “Hang Mike Pence”, saying they “had the right idea” and that Pence “deserved it.” (Trump denied saying “Hang Mike Pence.”)
Pence resisted appearing before the commission, believing it would not be helpful and not a good forum for him to appear, councilors said. But he agreed that his aides, including Short, would speak and blessed their cooperation.
In a January testimony, Short described Pence’s behavior on Jan. 6 and his interaction with Trump. The commission will probably use videos from Short’s testimony. Thursday’s hearing will include live testimony from Pence’s attorney, Greg Jacob, who testified at a meeting at the Oval Office between Pence, Trump and others on January 4, 2021, in which attorney John Eastman outlined scenarios for Biden’s refusal to be president.
Pence did not look for opportunities to attack Trump directly, but he defended himself when he took heat from Trump and his allies. Several people who have spoken to him in private say he has no plans to attack Trump for some of his more inflammatory actions in office, and sees no political line in explicitly criticizing Trump.
“President Trump is wrong,” Pence said in February at a meeting of the Federal Society in Florida. I had no right to cancel the election.
Pence has not spoken to Trump in more than a year and has turned down initial invitations to visit him in Mar-a-Lago, advisers said. A Trump spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
Pence has told others he can run against Trump, and allies are pushing for an announcement early next year. He has embarked on an aggressive schedule to travel to the states in early 2024, especially South Carolina and Iowa.
Early Republican polls in 2024 consistently show that Pence is lagging behind Trump and other potential candidates such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. Such studies are not reliable predictions that are so far from an election, but they could show that Pence may be struggling to find a strong support base.
His case in front of the voters is that he supported Trump, but he did not have the power to do what Trump wanted. He gave this explanation when asked by donors and activists during his trip to a South Carolina pregnancy crisis center last month, according to a person who heard his comments. Pence is not negative about Trump in these private conversations, the man said.
“He was asked in several places here and there what he thought about it, and he usually just said, ‘The vice president has a ceremonial role there.’ I didn’t have the constitutional authority to do that, “said Josh Kimbrell, a South Carolina senator who organized trips to Pence and accompanied him around the state. “We’ve been to eight events together, and of the eight events we’ve been to, maybe four times. That was not the dominant theme. “
Some of his advisers point out that Trump, after leaving office, did not set Pence on fire as viciously as some other former advisers, such as former Attorney General William P. Barr or former Secretary of Defense Mark T. Esper, and that most Trump’s harsh words about Pence come from a spokesman, not the former president himself. Pence often praises the Trump-Pence agenda.
“Mike Pence makes a clear distinction between being proud of the policies he has helped over the past four years, and sees this as separate from what he was asked and pressured to do after the election,” said Tim Phillips, a Republican operative. and an ally of Pence. “He is proud of the policies he has helped to implement and he is proud of what he did in the post-election period. He shares these things. “
Pence also joined other Republicans in criticizing Democrats and the media for focusing too much on Jan. 6. The councilor said the Pence team believed that Republican voters were becoming less interested in the 2020 election and that the remaining anger at Pence that day had eased. He found that when he visited the states in early 2024, he was not asked about it so often.
Pence only briefly mentioned the 2020 election, for example, at last month’s pre-election rally for Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. This appearance was another way for him to establish his independence from Trump without attacking him directly, as Trump supported a failed challenge by former Senator David Purdue in the Republican primary.
Pence’s focus on the 2022 campaign and highlighting Republican priorities – he has just returned from a border visit – instead of fighting for the 2020 election, contrasts with Trump, the man said. contact with the former vice president, who spoke anonymously discussing personal conversations. Pence will spend Thursday in Ohio raising funds with Gov. Mike DeWain and Representative Steve Chabot and will join DeWine for a roundtable with an oil and gas industry group.
Ohio’s commitment is the reason Pence did not appear at the Coalition for Faith and Freedom conference, the man said, adding that the fear he faced the last time was not a factor in the decision.
A connoisseur of the conference said Pence remained close to coalition founder and chairman Ralph Reed and would be invited again. Pence and Reed appeared together last month at an event in North Carolina.
Although Pence was invited to speak on Reed’s program in Nashville, many were involved, he was not advertised as an invited speaker on the conference website. The lineup includes other potential Republican candidates for 2024, including Sen. Tim Scott (SC), Senator Rick Scott (Florida), former South Carolina Gov. Nicki Haley, and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The highest-paid speaker: Trump.
Annie Linsky contributed to this report.
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