Has Anyone Seen Mike Pence? – Mother Jones

The Republican Nationwide Conference, which kicked off Monday in Milwaukee, is a super-powerful magnet for anybody with even a passing connection to conservative politics. To enter the Fiserv Discussion board downtown, I first needed to go by Erik Prince and Kari Lake. Ron Johnson flits about, keeping off followers. As I spoke with delegates within the concourse in the course of the afternoon session, Jason Chaffetz periodically handed by, like a small piece of area junk orbiting the Earth. I’ve seen conservative influencers and candidates I’ve forgotten about. I simply noticed Mike Lindell. However one particular person is conspicuously lacking. Has anybody seen Mike Pence?

On Monday, as Republicans awaited Trump’s announcement of J.D. Vance as his subsequent operating mate, the person who had joined him on the ticket twice and served alongside him as vp for 4 years was very conspicuously not there. Not contained in the beefed-up safety perimeter. Not in Wisconsin, as far as I can inform. And really a lot not endorsing Trump. If the largest story amongst convention-goers was Trump’s hunt for a operating mate, then the defining story of his candidacy, as Matt Gertz not too long ago wrote at Media Issues, is what occurred to his previous one.

The wanting it, as you’ll recall, was that Trump pressured Pence to refuse to certify the Electoral School outcomes on January 6, 2021. After Pence refused, Trump despatched a mob to the Capitol to bodily cease the certification. Some members of the mob shouted “Hold Mike Pence!” Curiously, that was not the ultimate straw for Pence—who mentioned this spring that he had “forgiven” the previous president, however that he couldn’t endorse his marketing campaign, partly, due to his not too long ago declared opposition to banning TikTok. However it was the ultimate straw for Trump.

This falling-out over whether or not the final vice presidential nominee ought to have accepted the election outcomes was why we have been spending our Monday ready for the white smoke that might portend a brand new vice presidential nominee. And Pence’s legacy was shaping how Trump’s followers considered the job itself. After I spoke with supporters of the Republican nominee on Monday, the takeaway from that episode, and the primary administration as an entire, was clear: Trump wanted somebody who would stand by him it doesn’t matter what.

“I don’t even wish to say,” mentioned Rose Roque, a Florida Republican, making a face, once I requested her concerning the occasion’s earlier next-in-line.

However her daughter, Rose Rodriguez, was prepared to go additional. “He betrayed his nation,” she mentioned, referring to Pence’s resolution to certify the Electoral School outcomes on January 6. “Though he thought he was doing the right factor, in keeping with him, he let himself be poisoned. And I feel he already was poisoned—he got here in already being that method.”

“If Gen. Flynn would have been vp,” Rodriguez continued, referring to Trump’s short-lived nationwide safety advisor Michael Flynn, who had recommended after the 2020 election that Trump might order the navy to grab voting machines. “Gen. Flynn would have carried out issues by the structure, he would have upheld the structure and carried out the suitable factor and we wouldn’t be within the mess we’re.”

Pence “appeared to be making an attempt to do a balancing act and it by no means actually labored,” mentioned Michael Rosen, a New Jersey Republican who was standing by a giant Trump 2024 signal exterior the sector. Trump wanted “Somebody who’s gonna work with him and never gonna go away him in a lurch on the finish. [Pence] ought to have labored with Trump when he was going by way of all that stuff as an alternative of throwing his fingers up and saying ‘I’ve obtained no management.’ We have been type of left with nothing.”

“He was an awesome vp till he wasn’t,” mentioned Mike Bassett, a Nevada Republican. One in every of his high necessities for a vp was “loyalty to Trump.”

I did speak to delegates who wished governing or managerial expertise, sturdy communication abilities, and even a little bit of gender or racial variety from their VP. Republicans floated Byron Donalds and Tulsi Gabbard. A couple of particular person pined for Glenn Youngkin. However Pence had solid a shadow over the search. A lot so, that after I completed speaking with Rosen, one other New Jersey Republican, Rimma Yakobovich, piped up along with her personal suggestion.

There was one clear method to get a Republican operating mater who completely wouldn’t “stab him within the again,” she mentioned. Her thought? “Don Jr.”