'Pence found his spine': Former VP praised on social media after refusing to endorse Trump
By: Carl Gibson (Alternet.org)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Former Vice President Mike Pence gives remarks at the Calvin Coolidge Foundation's conference at the Library of Congress on February 16, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images). Carl GibsonMarch 15, 2024Frontpage featured
Former Vice President Mike Pence turned plenty of heads during a Fox News interview on Friday in which he flatly told host Martha McCallum that he would not be endorsing former President Donald Trump's third bid for the White House.
"We have not heard from you. Will you be endorsing your former president?" McCallum asked. "You were on a ticket with him last time around."
"Well, Martha, I appreciate the question," Pence said after a pause. "And it should come as no surprise that I will not be endorsing Donald Trump this year."
But Pence's interview surprised many on X (the social media platform formerly known as Twitter), who heaped praise on the former Indiana governor for being one of a scant few Republicans refusing to hop on board the Trump train in 2024.
Washington Post political reporter Aaron Blake tweeted that Pence's refusal to endorse his old boss is "obviously very significant," adding that he is taking "a very different approach from others like Kemp/Sununu etc., who basically said they have to pick a side." He noted that during one of last year's Republican presidential primary debates, "Pence raised his hand when candidates were asked if they'd support even a convicted Trump. That's changed."
Others were less surprised, like former CIA operative John Sipher, who opined "I think we are so beaten down that we aren't shocked that the former President's own Vice President is against him." University College London professor Brian Klaas observed: "The people who worked most closely with Trump almost universally think he should be nowhere near the White House." And MSNBC host Katie Phang was effusive in her praise, tweeting "Pence found his spine again."
Pence fell out of favor with Trump on January 6, 2021, when he refused to use his position as the presiding officer over the US Senate's counting of Electoral College votes to declare Trump the winner. After Trump supporters stormed the US Capitol in an effort to disrupt Congress' certification of the 2020 election, Pence was whisked away by Secret Service agents to a hidden location. During the capitol siege, Trump refused to call off his supporters, and faulted Mike Pence in a tweet, saying he "didn't have the courage to do what should have been done." January 6 insurrectionists even built a gallows outside of the capitol building and chanted "hang Mike Pence" as they roamed the halls of Congress.
However, Pence tried until the very end to keep Trump in power despite him losing both the Electoral College majority and the popular vote to Joe Biden. The book Peril, by journalists Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, described an exchange between Pence and former Vice President Dan Quayle, whom Pence was in close contact with toward the end of the Trump administration. In their conversation, Pence pressed Quayle repeatedly, asking him about any legal way to use his powers to keep Trump in office. When Quayle told him there was no way to do it, Pence pushed back, saying "you don't know the position I'm in."
"'I do know the position you're in," Quayle told Pence. "I also know what the law is. You listen to the parliamentarian. That's all you do. You have no power."
Other political observers on X attributed Pence's refusal to endorse the 45th president of the United States to the crowds of angry Trump supporters calling for his neck. Mother Jones journalist David Corn tweeted that Pence not endorsing Trump was a "brave move," pointing out that Trump "almost got him killed." Independent journalist Marcy Wheeler summed up McCallum's initial question by writing "Donald Trump almost got you assassinated. Will you put that behind you in the name of Republican solidarity?" X user @thetrueshelby was more succinct, tweeting "he did try and hang him, y'all."
Still, former Obama administration official Anthony Coley lauded Pence for his lack of endorsement, writing that "more conservative voices — people who are known and respected by the GOP base — need to follow suit and speak out against the grave danger Trump poses to our democracy" in order to "break the fever that is Trumpism."
Good to see that another individual has the integrity to stand up to Trump.
Funny (not at all) how so many of Trump's former inner circle indicate that he should never be PotUS again.
that idiot had a 50/50 shot of being in the running right now if he had exploited trump's attempt on his life and gotten way out in front on the bash trump train. what a thumper moron. now he's a political has-been to maga and the evangelicals. what vision he had...
That strategy would not work in the current GOP. The current GOP has and is kicking out anyone who opposes Trump. The current GOP is a very different party than it was prior to around 2018.
there was a brief window in time where the odds were closer to being in his favor, but he caved, and then mcconnell and mccarthy caved...
Video description for Buzz:
McConnell speaking in the Senate: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called Donald Trump "practically and morally responsible" for his supporters' deadly attack on the Capitol . . .
I'm not willing to grant that he has all that much integrity.
If there had been a way he could legally have inflicted Trump on us for another 4 years, he'd have done so. Props to Dan Quayle.
Well that is slimy as hell. But the GOP is sucking air in terms of integrity so bucking Trump, as Pence just did, is much better than what the vast majority of the GOP is doing.
Just when I thought they couldn't bury the bar any deeper.
Re: his "integrity"-- its definitely "a mixed picture."
for such an upstanding xtian guy, he sure seemed reluctant and a bit tardy in applying his values.
A bit?
One would have thought that, even if he couldn't do the ethical thing, actually being aware that Trump's words against him during the failed insurrection endangered his life should have prompted him to do the right thing out of self-interest.
Politics is an ugly force that distorts minds.
So much for the agreement he signed to back whomever the Republican nominee was.
Fuck him, his career is done anyways.
Trump certainly isn't endorsing Pence for anything, except a hanging!
Pence realizes that the water has run out from a hole in the bottom of his canteen. His national political career is over. His next step is finding a suitable place among the nations Christian evangelists.
He is not helping his cause with that group by going against Trump.
that's what's so hilarious, pence was put on the ticket to deliver the thumpers to trump...
I was in a somewhat snarky , sarcastic mood and was going to say "Hang Mike Pence".
(But being the emotionally sensitive & compassionate person that I am I decided not too...)
Anyone remember this? (from the January 6th insurrection)
The House select committee investigating the Capitol assault showed video of the gallows when it opened its hearing on Thursday, as it detailed the intense pressure campaign that Mr. Trump waged against Mr. Pence, the threats of violence against him, how his security team tried to keep him safe from the mob, and how Mr. Trump reacted approvingly to his supporters’ threats to execute the vice president.
Liberty University is all out of Falwell's...
liberty university wouldn't be a good fit for pence. his wife only lets him have sex to procreate...
in fact, all the times he's found his spine in the past, it was actually his wife's spine due to it's light usage...
It's beyond amazing that we have a low life like Trump as the Republican nominee for president. No one learned a lesson last time around.
the republican party's presidential candidate is out on bail, in 4 different court cases...