Since leaving office, former Vice President Mike Pence has been himself from his old boss Donald Trump. In July, Trump returned to Washington for the first time since leaving the White House, and Pence gave a conflicting speech in the same city on the same day.
But for the first time this week, Pence went after Trump directly.
Speaking Wednesday evening before students at Georgetown University, Pence was asked whether he would vote for Trump if Trump becomes the Republican Party’s nominee for president in 2024.
“Well, there might be somebody else I’d prefer more,” Pence said, drawing applause from the crowd — a direct challenge to the 45th president who values loyalty above all else.
Pence wants to stand in stark contrast to other Trump appointees like former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who told reporters last year, “I would not run if President Trump ran.”
On the Democratic side, many of the big names — like Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren — have explicitly committed to supporting Biden in the 2024 primaries. “I’m not running for president in 2024,” Warren said on NBC News in April. “President Biden is running for reelection in 2024, and I’m supporting him.”
In fact, Pence also stands in contrast to Trump’s other competitors like Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis. Unlike DeSantis, Pence is taking questions about Trump’s future in the party.
Last year, DeSantis refused to answer a question about running for president. “I’m not considering anything beyond doing my job,” DeSantis said on Fox News. “We got a lot of stuff going on in Florida. I’m going to be running for reelection next year.”
Not Pence!
“I have every confidence that the Republican Party is going to sort out leadership,” Pence said in D.C. Wednesday. “All my focus has been on the midterm elections, and it’ll stay that way for the next 20 days. After that, we’ll be thinking about the future, ours and the nation’s. And I’ll keep you posted.”
Take a look at Pence’s remark —
Former Vice Pres. Mike Pence had this to say when asked if he would vote for Donald Trump in 2024, if his former boss is the Republican presidential nominee: "There might be somebody else I'd prefer more." https://t.co/9GFNbQmuZV pic.twitter.com/bPEfrIIRfa
— ABC News (@ABC) October 20, 2022
Focus on the midterms, Pence also addressed more current topics in his wide-ranging speaking gig. He admonished “Putin apologists” unwilling to stand up to the Russian leader over his assault on Ukraine.
Speaking at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington less than a month before November’s midterm elections, Pence addressed the growing gulf between traditional conservatives and a new generation of populist candidates.
“Our movement cannot forsake the foundational commitment that we have to security, to limited government, to liberty and to life. But nor can we allow our movement to be led astray by the siren song of unprincipled populism that’s unmoored from our oldest traditions and most cherished values,” he told the think tank audience. “Let me say: This movement and the party that it animates must remain the movement of a strong national defense, limited government and traditional moral values and life.”
To that end, Pence criticized those in the party who have pushed a more isolationist foreign policy, particularly when it comes to Russian aggression. Earlier Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared martial law for four illegally annexed Ukrainian regions as his forces have suffered stinging battlefield defeats and renewed attacks on Ukrainian cities and vital infrastructure.
“Now, I know there is a rising chorus in our party, including some new voices to our movement, who would have us disengaged with the wider world,” Pence said. “But appeasement has never worked, ever, in history. And now more than ever, we need a conservative movement committed to America’s role as leader of the free world and as a vanguard of American values.”
“As Russia continues its unconscionable war of aggression to Ukraine, I believe that conservatives must make it clear that Putin must stop and Putin will pay,” he added. “There can be no room in the conservative movement for apologists to Putin. There is only room in this movement for champions of freedom.”
Pence has been traveling the country, campaigning on behalf of Republican midterm candidates as he lays the groundwork for a potential 2024 presidential campaign. Some of the candidates he has endorsed have espoused the kinds of populist and isolationist views he seemed to take issue with Wednesday. Arizona’s Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters, for instance, has labeled the Russia-Ukraine conflict a “European problem” and has criticized federal spending on Ukraine.
Pence’s speech largely focused on the conservative “Freedom Agenda” that he released earlier this year. It serves as both a concrete policy plan for Republicans as well as an implicit criticism of Trump, who has spent much of his post-presidency trying to relitigate a presidential election from two years ago.
Pence once again stressed the importance of the oath he took when he was sworn in as vice president, adding that, “The American people must know that conservatives will not simply pay lip service to keeping faith with the Constitution, but that we will always keep our oath — that we will keep our oath, as the Bible says, even when it hurts” and “stand for the Constitution … even when it would be politically expedient to do otherwise.”
Even after stiff-arming Trump, Pence has touted the Trump-Pence administration’s accomplishments, like the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
Pence’s “Freedom Agenda” intends to “permanently extend the Trump/Pence tax cuts that… are set to expire in 2025.”
Pence’s speech was briefly interrupted at one point by audience members who walked out of the auditorium in protest.
Take a look —
Protest outside Pence speech: pic.twitter.com/RLKbUbiQP8
— David Smith (@SmithInAmerica) October 20, 2022
The Horn editorial team and the Associated Press contributed to this article.