He worked for the New York Real Estate / Entertainment guy that wrestled the Republican Party away from the establishment…In doing so?…That guy ripped the ass out of the party….
He had his boss, the President of United States back….
Until….
Until his boss….
Donald Trump….
The 45th President of the United States of America tried to get him to help steal and election….
And?
Stood by while crowd came for him, to hurt him….
Back in the day Republicanism has been cast aside these days…
Can Mike Pence start to bring it back?….
It would be a high and difficult hill to climb…..
A six-term congressman and former governor of Indiana, Pence spent nearly five years as Trump’s obsequious sidekick — a quiet badge of conservative credibility next to the volatile political newcomer, always ready with a display of fealty or a look of solemn assent. But in the 18 months since the two men split, Pence has flipped a switch, returning to the path he was on before he began praising Trump in their private chats on the golf course. Pence wants everyone to know that he is once again his own man — and his team is looking to reintroduce him ahead of a possible 2024 presidential bid….
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But it remains unclear if voters want what Pence is selling. Sarah Longwell, an anti-Trump Republican strategist who has been conducting regular focus groups with Republican voters, said there is little evidence of a public groundswell for Pence, while other possible alternatives to Trump, like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, appear to be in vogue. Pence’s name is almost never volunteered as a preferred candidate in her groups, and polls consistently show him trailing a range of other Republican candidates.
“We ask people, ‘So what about Mike Pence?’ and you get a lot of: ‘Eh,’” she said. “That’s the sound people make — ‘Eh.’”
And though Pence’s team says he would run in part on the conservative accomplishments of the Trump-Pence administration, Longwell found in her focus groups that hardcore Trump voters prize Trump’s combative ethos.
“Why wouldn’t a MAGA voter choose him?” she asked. “That presupposes it’s somehow about policy and not culture-warrior combative grievance stuff. Why do they like DeSantis? Because he fights.”
Even some of Pence’s allies say he is likely to face an uphill path at best in 2024. There doesn’t seem to be much clamor for his brand of politics, and Trump is likely to slash him aggressively should he announce for president, some say….
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To watch Pence on the campaign trail today, as a yet unannounced candidate, is to witness a throwback to an earlier time in Republican politics — broadly saccharin, full of homages to Ronald Reagan and attempts at small-town humor. Pence’s new nonprofit, Advancing American Freedom, has been planning retreats with donors in the mountain West, last year in Wyoming and this fall in Montana. The board is stacked with social conservative and evangelical leaders.
“He is doing all the things you would do to appeal to that wing of the party,” said Gary Bauer, an evangelical activist and former presidential candidate who sits on the board. “He stays in contact with the whole conservative movement.”….
image…Politico/ Sean Rayford/Getty