Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips.
—Proverbs 27:2
On Wednesday, April 20, 2016, which was an unseasonably warm day in Indianapolis, Mike Pence stood at the front steps of the governor’s mansion wearing a light gray suit, white shirt, and blue tie. Blooming pansies and violets filled two big planters to either side of him. His serene face betrayed no emotion as a pair of black SUVs slowly entered the curved driveway. When the car stopped, Donald J. Trump and New Jersey governor Chris Christie emerged from the back seat of one of the SUVs into the warmth of the day. The three stood and chatted for a moment before they entered the mansion, followed by their aides. Christie would come to rue this day. It was the start of a beautiful friendship, or at least a strategic alliance, between Trump and Pence.
Inside, Trump and Christie found a homey version of an official residence. Family photos were arranged on the stairway leading to the second floor. A beagle named Maverick and two cats—Oreo and Pickle—wandered the house, and somewhere a bunny named Marlon Bundo and a snake named Sapphira were safely put away. A notorious germophobe, Donald Trump had owned a dog early in his first marriage, but he generally considered pets to be déclassé.
As governor of New Jersey, Christie had come to know Pence through the Republican Governors Association. He had been acquainted with Trump much longer. Christie had endorsed Trump after ending his own presidential campaign, becoming one of the very first to pick him out of the big field of candidates. For weeks, Christie had campaigned for the front-running candidate, often appearing with Trump, where he had a tendency to let his face go blank. This invited observers to imagine he was more than a little ambivalent about his circumstance. Trump was a vulgar man with no government experience, and in the previous year, Christie had said, “I just don’t think that he’s suited to be president of the United States.”1 From this starting point, he had evolved into a key Trump surrogate and the broker for this meeting with Pence.
Trump, who claimed to have a great memory, should have remembered that he had met with Pence twice before. A few years prior, Pence had visited with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Before that, in November 2011, Pence had met with Trump to ask for his financial support as he prepared to run for governor. This time, it was Trump who wanted something. The Indiana presidential primary was two weeks away, and Trump was fresh off a resounding victory in his home state of New York. He was hoping for a decisive win that would end the chances of his only remaining competitor, Texas senator Ted Cruz. He knew that Pence was unlikely to give him an endorsement. Pence and Cruz were aligned as hard-right Christians, and Cruz had offered Pence public support in 2015 after Pence signed the Indiana religious freedom act. “Governor Pence is holding the line to protect religious liberty in the Hoosier State,” Cruz had said at that time. “I’m proud to stand with Mike.”2 It was logical that Pence would now be expected to return the favor—by supporting Cruz in what could become a make-or-break primary on the march to the Republican convention.
Christie’s job was to help convince Pence to tone down his expected primary endorsement. Endorse Cruz if you must, was his message, but avoid saying anything negative about Trump. Cruz had dismissed the outcome in New York as a matter of home-field advantage. However, he was desperate to win in Indiana, where a May 3 victory for Trump would lead to the nomination at the national convention. If Pence would temper his support for Cruz, Trump would return in the fall to help the governor, who faced a difficult reelection bid against Democrat John Gregg.
The meeting went well. Pence would still back Cruz, but in the mildest terms. Christie departed first, flying back to New Jersey, his mission accomplished.
Trump and Pence talked a bit more and hit it off. Afterward, Trump rode off to a campaign stop at the Indiana State Fairgrounds, where he railed against “Lyin’ Ted” Cruz and his likely Democratic opponent, “Crooked” Hillary Clinton. He also made a point of expressing his support for the state’s governor and even hinted that he had come to Indianapolis just for his meeting with Pence.
“You know I wasn’t supposed to be here today,” said Trump. “I’m supposed to be here in two weeks. You know that, but I had to come early,” he added. “By the way, I have to tell you, you have a governor, Governor Pence is really fighting hard for you.” He might have planned to say more, but a protester interrupted his monologue. “Get him out,” Trump said, pointing at a man wearing a Trump mask. “Get him out, that’s all right.”
* * *
As Ted Cruz campaigned in Indiana, he understood he was the only one who stood between Trump and the Republican nomination. Governor John Kasich of Ohio was on the ballot, but he had no realistic chance to win. The key for Cruz could be a strong endorsement from Pence, which might shore up the conservative Christian vote. Trump was going for blue-collar workers by visiting industrial plants like a Carrier air-conditioning factory, where he promised to save jobs slated to be moved to a lower-cost facility in Mexico. (State aid facilitated by Pence would delay the move but not save the jobs.)
Pence finally made his move on April 29, a few days before the balloting. Then, rather than appearing with the Texas senator so Cruz could get photos with him, Pence booked an on-air visit with radio host Greg Garrison, who had replaced him years earlier as Indiana’s conservative radio voice. In his statement, Pence used the word clear twice, which signaled the truth of the matter, which was that his endorsement was hardly ringing.3
It’s clear, this is a time for choosing. I have met with all three candidates … and I want to say clearly I like and respect all three of the Republican candidates in the field. I particularly want to commend Donald Trump, who I think has given voice to the frustration of millions of working Americans with the lack of progress in Washington, D.C.
And I’m also particularly grateful that Donald Trump has taken a strong stand for Hoosier jobs when we saw jobs in the Carrier Company abruptly announce leaving Indiana—and not for another state but for Mexico. I’m grateful for his voice in the national debate. Let me say, I’ve come to my decision on whom I’m supporting, and I’m not against anybody, but I will be voting for Ted Cruz in the upcoming Republican primary. I see Ted Cruz as a principled conservative who has dedicated his career to advocating the Reagan agenda.
Governor Pence, who understood that Cruz could only slow and not stop Donald Trump’s march to the nomination, had served himself well by recognizing what Trump needed and delivering it. The milquetoast quality of his endorsement made it clear that his loyalists could support Trump without reservation, and many did. On Election Day, the New Yorker grabbed 53 percent of the vote, swamping Cruz’s 38 points. Kasich dropped out, and Reince Priebus, chairman of the GOP, announced that Trump was the presumptive nominee. This statement freed every Republican and the party’s donors to focus on supporting one man and opposing Clinton.
As Indiana’s Republican primary voters clinched things for Trump, Chris Christie could take some of the credit for the Pence maneuver. Surely he thought that Trump appreciated what he had done, and as he continued to travel around the country on Trump’s behalf, speculation raged over whether he might be the nominee for vice president. Approaching the end of his second term as governor, Christie’s approval rating was below 30 percent, which meant he was doing far worse than Pence was doing in Indiana. But superficially, at least, he seemed to have more in common with Trump. Both were tough-talking, brash and egotistical. This made it hard for him to play a supporting role in Trump’s campaign. Indeed, Christie was so much like Trump that his presence on the GOP ticket would do little to reassure voters who were concerned about the New Yorker’s style. To make things worse, Trump had taken to teasing Christie in public.
When Christie was with Trump in Youngstown and the candidate intended to mock Ohio’s own governor, Kasich, Trump couldn’t resist bullying Christie too. Like Kasich, Christie had spent weeks looking for votes in New Hampshire, with little success.
“Where’s Chris? Is Chris around?” said Trump as a campaign rally crowd looked on. “Even more than Chris Christie, he was there [in New Hampshire],” Trump said of Kasich. “I hated to do that, but I had to make my point,” he said to Christie.
Christie was forced to roll with the punches when he was teased, especially about his weight. His answer to insults was always to play along. He even joked with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show about the proper method of eating M&Ms. It was harder for Christie when Trump was the one taking shots at him. After Trump agreed to help out with Christie’s estimated $250,000 presidential campaign debt, Trump made fun of him for it. This was the campaigning style of an insult comic, and yet it worked for Trump. At an appearance on Christie’s home turf—Lawrence Township, New Jersey—Trump said, “There’s nothing like New Jersey. Wise guys, so many wise guys. If you can make it in New Jersey, you can do just about anything you want in life.” He then pivoted to the subject of jobs and joked he would stop eating Oreo cookies because the manufacturer, Nabisco, had moved one of its plants to Mexico.
“I’m not eating Oreos anymore—neither is Chris!” said Trump, pointing to Christie, seated to his right. “You’re not eating Oreos anymore. No more Oreos. For either of us, Chris. Don’t feel bad, for either of us.”
Playing along with the joke was a small price to pay for the prize Christie sought, so even as commentators and comedians pointed to the indignity of it all, Christie continued to serve as comic target at his rallies and met with skeptical Republicans to persuade them that Trump was worthy of their support. After one report had Trump ordering Christie to personally bring him fast food, reporters corralled the New Jersey governor at a campaign appearance. Trump had just lashed out at U.S. District Court judge Gonzalo P. Curiel, who was hearing a lawsuit in California against Trump University for allegedly deceptive practices. Trump called Curiel “a hater of Donald Trump” and claimed that the judge was Mexican and was biased against him. In fact, the judge was born in Indiana.
Assigned to clean up after Trump, Christie said that he didn’t “know the judge” or the particulars of the Trump University case (Trump eventually settled for a $25 million payout to deceived customers), but “Donald Trump is not a racist,” Christie said. “So, you know, the allegations that he is are absolutely contrary to every experience I’ve had with him over the last fourteen years, and so we’re going to end it there.”
As the Republican National Convention approached, news reports circulated that Christie was in line for the job he was angling for with Trump: vice president. The choice would be a bit unconventional, as it violated the usual practice of a presidential candidate seeking to “balance” the top of the ticket. Later, members of Pence’s staff claimed that Christie himself was the source of the rumors that he was being strongly considered. “He was the one doing all the leaking about the decision,” one said. A Trump-Christie combination would put two people from the same region and with the same personal style together. It would also run contrary to Trump’s preference, whenever he hired someone, for a person whose good looks reflected well on the boss. Trump considered job-seekers in the way a casting director regarded a group of actors auditioning for a role. He preferred people who looked the part.
Presidential candidates select their own running mates, and some use the process to test the feelings of party leaders as well as voters. (It can also be a way to identify members of a cabinet.) On July 9, a week before the convention would begin, Christie was asked to meet with A. B. Culvahouse Jr., an attorney who had helped John McCain review his choices for vice president in 2008. This was considered the final step before Trump would make his decision. The press also reported that former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, and Mike Pence were under consideration. Christie enjoyed front-runner status, in part because he had a good rapport with Trump and in part because he had shown himself to be a loyal and effective campaigner.
Although Christie could bring skills and a comfort level to the Trump campaign, he had two problems. First, despite Trump’s claims of financial independence, his campaign was looking for funding support. Neither Christie nor Flynn would be a conduit for campaign contributions. Gingrich had some fund-raising strength, but Pence, who had broad support from right-wing donors like Charles and David Koch, was just as likely to be able to tap the wallets of skeptical donors. The more nagging, immediate problem for Christie, and one he could not escape, was the question of how much influence Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, would have in the final decision. As U.S. attorney in New Jersey in 2005, Christie successfully prosecuted Kushner’s father, Charles, in a sordid case that included charges of illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion, and witness tampering. The witness tampering story was particularly ugly. Charles Kushner, thinking that his sister, Esther, and her husband were providing information against him to Christie, had set up the brother-in-law with a prostitute, filmed their sexual encounter, and sent the tape to his sister. Kushner was convicted and sentenced to two years in federal prison.
Christie’s secret meeting with Culvahouse had taken three hours and involved questions about personal issues and details surrounding the infamous “Bridgegate” scandal. (The governor’s closest aides had been charged with organizing a traffic jam during rush hour at the George Washington Bridge to retaliate against a New Jersey mayor who had not supported Christie’s reelection.) He had not even confirmed meeting with Culvahouse, but in a Facebook posting, Gingrich did describe his experience in the same process. Gingrich reported being grilled by Culvahouse and three other lawyers. He said Culvahouse told him, “If you run for president, the American people vet you, the news media vets you. But if you’re picked to be vice president, there is no—you’re not in a primary, you’re not out in the open. You’re not being investigated by the reporters. And so it’s a much more rigorous process, actually, to be vetted for vice president than there is to be vetted for president.”4
As the interviews proceeded, Trump highlighted the drama over his selection as if it were an episode of his reality TV show The Apprentice, where a winner is selected after grueling competitions. The Trump campaign leaked the fact that the four final candidates included Christie, Gingrich, Pence, and Flynn. Flynn’s star seemed to dim on July 10, when on ABC TV, he said that he supported abortion rights. No matter that Trump had been glossing over the fact that he had also once supported abortion rights. Flynn then appeared on the Fox News network, saying that he was actually against abortion rights; waffling on such an important issue would not sit well with the voters in the base Trump had assembled. Trump immediately signaled the problem: “I do like the military, but I do very much like the political,” Trump told The Washington Post. “I will make my mind up over the next three to four days. In my mind, I have someone that would be really good.”5
On Monday morning, July 11, Christie went to a rally in Virginia Beach, Virginia, to introduce Trump as he had many times since he’d quit the presidential race himself. Trump said he had “always demanded the best from everyone who has worked for him and with him,” Christie said. “He is someone who will give you confidence every night when you put your head on the pillow that his number-one priority will be the safety and security of your family.”6
This time, however, Christie was not invited to stay on the platform when Trump spoke. It was a subtle but obvious sign, and Christie had reason to be worried. In the meantime, Pence backers fretted too. They claimed that the New Jersey governor was issuing leaks to the news media about the vice presidential contest in order to boost his own position. In fact, the momentum had shifted in Pence’s direction. On Tuesday, July 12, Trump flew to Indianapolis for a campaign appearance with Pence. He was accompanied by Ivanka Trump, his daughter, and her husband, Kushner. Christie did not make the trip.
“I often joke, you’ll be calling up Mike Pence,” Trump said at the rally. “I don’t know if he’s going to be your governor or your vice president. Who the hell knows?”7
Rather than leave Indianapolis that night, Trump stayed in town. His aides said the cause was a flat tire on his airplane but mechanics can change a tire on a jetliner in about forty-five minutes. If Trump wanted to leave he could have, which meant he had a purpose in staying. This story would become a key element in the intrigue around the selection of Trump’s running mate. It would later emerge that Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort, who thought Pence would bring doubters to Trump’s side, might have concocted the flat tire tale in order to keep the candidate in Indiana. As CBS News and others would report, Trump had offered the job to Christie, but Manafort and Pence’s family hoped to change the candidate’s mind.
The layover gave Pence, the governor with an uncertain future, more time with Trump at dinner, where he was able to make a hard sales pitch for himself. On the following morning, Trump, Ivanka, Kushner, and the candidate’s son Donald Jr. were guests at the governor’s mansion for a ninety-minute breakfast meeting. To all appearances, the family was passing judgment on the man who secretly had become front-runner as the vice presidential candidate.8
Whether it was the family or Manafort or someone else who had propelled Pence to the front of the line, the Indiana governor had his own decision to make. “He was going into this with his eyes open,” said one source who was in close contact with Pence those days. “He knew exactly who Trump was and what he faced.” Pence and Karen pulled aside to pray for clarity, this source said. Pence believed that his political life had been guided by miracles, and had previously prayed for a clear sense of God’s purpose for him. Based on this perspective, the airplane’s flat tire could be seen as a sign from heaven. Now his prayers gave him the guidance he sought. He would accept. “Once he got to that point, he never looked back.”
* * *
After breakfast, Pence, wearing an open shirt, accompanied Trump to the candidate’s SUV. Neither man said a word to reporters, who were kept at a distance. As cameras recorded the departure, they shook hands vigorously. Trump patted the governor on the shoulder and pointed at Pence as he told him something. Pence appeared to agree in single syllables to what Trump had said. The men then turned to photographers, and Trump flashed a smile. Then he was on his way.
Before they left Indianapolis, Trump and his family met with Newt Gingrich, who seemed to be making a last-ditch effort for his own candidacy. In the meantime, aides to Pence told reporters that meetings with Trump had gone very well.
After Trump left the capital, Pence put on one of the governor’s signature polo shirts he had ordered for himself (it was emblazoned with his name) and went to the Indiana State Fair. His body language and words revealed little as he shook his head and shrugged at questions. Pence’s replies combined his typical, very un-Trumpian aw-shucks humility and statements that showed how he might help the man at the top of the ticket win over skeptical Christian conservatives.
“I’m thinking he’s giving it very careful consideration,” said Pence, “and we’re humbled to be a part of that. We were really honored to have not only Mr. Trump but a number of his children and son-in-law join us at the governor’s residence. It’s great to have them in Indiana and great to have a chance to break bread. Nothing was offered; nothing was accepted.… These are good people; this is a good family. He’s a dedicated family man, a great dad. He’s a builder, he’s a fighter, and he’s a patriot.” Pence was already campaigning to normalize the man he sought to serve; and Pence knew that what he had said about Trump that day was not “clear” at all—or true.9
Later, Pence would say that Trump called him one evening soon after the family visit and made the formal offer. “It was eleven o’clock at night,” Pence recalled, speaking to a gathering of Christian religious leaders. “We heard the call might be coming. We prayed all the way through it as a family, we talked it over with our kids, and we knew that we would answer the call if it came. I picked up the phone at eleven o’clock with Karen at my side in the governor’s residence, and I heard that familiar voice, and he said, ‘Mike, it’s going to be great.’”10
Trump delayed announcing his choice when a terrorist driving a truck in Nice, France, on July 14, killed 86 people and injured 458. Pence and his team, however, circulated word that he was the choice. Among themselves, aides and friends debated whether Pence should accept. Two of Pence’s closest political friends, Ryan Streeter and Al Hubbard, decried Trump’s lack of principles and mean-spirited style and advised against joining the ticket. Pence, sensing his big chance was at hand, rejected their counsel. Finally, on Saturday, July 16, Trump made the announcement during an event at the New York Hilton Hotel. “I found the leader who will help deliver a safe society and a prosperous, really prosperous society for all Americans. Indiana governor Mike Pence was my first choice.”11
That phrasing—first choice—must have especially galled Christie, who admitted to disappointment. “Of course,” he told reporters a few days later at the Republican National Convention. “I don’t get into anything that I don’t want to win. So when you’re not picked, of course it’s disappointing. You know, I’ve been through this parade before, and I realize that it’s like getting hit by lightning.… So it didn’t happen, that’s fine … you get disappointed, you take a deep breath and you get ready for tomorrow.”12
For consolation, everyone figured—especially Christie—that if Trump won the election, Christie would be given an important post in the administration. The same was true for Michael Flynn, who vigorously supported Trump and would campaign for him throughout the summer and fall. Flynn became a highly controversial figure as he continued to make appearances on Trump’s behalf, crossing a political divide usually respected by members of the military.
Flynn was an accomplished, veteran intelligence officer. He had served with distinction in Iraq and Afghanistan for a decade and had been appointed director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in 2012. It was in this job where his chaotic, confrontational management style became a serious problem. In 2014, two years into his tenure at the DIA, President Obama considered complaints from the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, and other professionals and decided that Flynn had to go.
Untethered, Flynn began advocating his own solution to geopolitical problems. He paid special attention to Syria, where he wanted the United States and Russia to cooperate in fighting the Islamic State. His willingness to speak openly won invitations to appear on the Qatar-based Al Jazeera Network and on RT—Russia Today, a Russian government–owned, English-language television network. In these appearances, Flynn avoided criticizing President Obama directly, focusing instead on issuing warnings about “radical Islam.” He came across as the kind of tough guy who appealed to Donald Trump. However, Flynn suffered from certain deficiencies as a public advocate. Steve Coll, Pulitzer Prize–winning author and chronicler of U.S. troubles in Afghanistan, said Flynn’s skills on the battlefield did not translate well into politics. “He was promoted above the level he was suited for when he was promoted to head the Defense Intelligence Agency, which is a big bureaucracy and really a Washington insider’s job. He had spent years on the battlefield; he was trained as a tactical intelligence leader, a door-kicker,” said Coll. “When he got fired at DIA during the Obama administration, I think it really infuriated him, and it set him off on a course which I can’t explain entirely, which is very different from who he was in the military.”13
Flynn’s overarching concern was the growth of ISIS, which he was ready to fight with methods others rejected, including torture and the killing of terrorists’ families. At the same time, Flynn criticized the Bush and Obama administrations for weakness in dealing with terrorism: “I think the narrative was that al Qaeda was on the run, and [Osama] bin Laden was dead.… They’re dead and these guys are, we’ve beaten them,” Flynn said—but the problem was that no matter how many terrorist leaders they killed, they “continue to just multiply.”14
When it came to domestic affairs, the newly minted angry private citizen Michael Flynn frequently criticized Hillary Clinton for the use of a private email server and said she should quit the presidential race. “If it were me,” said Flynn on CNN, “I would have been out the door and probably in jail.” He also criticized President Obama and his administration for not recognizing the danger represented by ISIS.
By mid-2016, Flynn had perfected his positions and his speaking style, and appeared regularly on television. At the GOP national convention in Cleveland, where he acted as a surrogate for Donald Trump, Flynn agreed to a live video interview with Michael Isikoff, the chief investigative correspondent for Yahoo News. Isikoff focused less on Trump than on the general’s life as a private citizen and asked him about his travel to Moscow in 2015 to deliver a speech about U.S.-Russian relations. During the visit, Flynn sat next to Russian president Vladimir Putin at a dinner celebrating the creation of RT.
With the convention floor in the background, Isikoff asked why Flynn had agreed to sit with Putin at an event honoring a propaganda arm of the Russian government. Flynn had been caught off guard, and his angry response was unconvincing.
“Because I wanted to tell Russia to get Iran the hell out of the four proxy wars they’re involved in in the Middle East in order for us to settle the situation down,” he said, rambling on about a situation with which he had no official status—more than a year after he had left the Defense Intelligence Agency.
“Were you paid for that event?” Isikoff asked.
Flynn’s eyes drifted for an instant before he tried to answer.
“I … You’d have to my, uh … the folks I went over there to, to…” Flynn said, waving his hand in Isikoff’s direction.
“I’m asking you, you’d know if you were paid.”
“Yeah, I went over there. It was a speaking event, it was a speaking event.”
“And…”
“What difference does that make?”
“Well…”
“Is somebody gonna go, ‘Ooh, he’s paid by the Russians…’”
“Well, Donald Trump has made a lot of the fact that Hillary Clinton has taken a lot of money from Wall Street, Goldman Sachs—”
Flynn interrupted Isikoff, shaking his head, leaning back in his chair overlooking the convention floor.
“I didn’t take any money from Russia, if that’s what you’re asking me.”
“Then who paid you?”
“My … my speakers’ bureau. Ask them.”
“OK.”
“So I was given a great opportunity and I took it.”15
Eventually, it was disclosed that Flynn received $45,000 for the Russia trip and did not declare the funds on his government financial disclosure form. Flynn could only hope that the interview, which was conducted for the Yahoo website, would not be widely circulated.
When Flynn finally addressed the convention delegates, he assailed President Obama. “We are tired of Obama’s empty speeches and his misguided rhetoric,” he said. “This, this has caused the world to have no respect for America’s word, nor does it fear our might.” He then launched into a familiar attack on Hillary Clinton as all things evil in the world. At the mention of her name, Flynn joined in with the chants of the ardent convention-goers.
“Lock her up. Lock her up,” chanted the crowd.
“Damn right,” said Flynn. “Exactly right. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
Flynn continued, adding, “You know why we’re saying that? We’re saying that because if I, a guy who knows this business, if I did a tenth, a tenth of what she did, I would be in jail today.”
A week after the convention, Flynn blamed Clinton’s campaign and Democrats in general for charges that Russians were hacking U.S. political sites. On the social media platform Twitter, he wrote, “The corrupt Democratic machine will do and say anything to get #NeverHillary into power. This is a new low.” He appended an anti-Semitic comment from a user named Sait Bibiana (@30PiecesofAG_): “Cnn implicated. ‘The USSR is to blame!’ … Not anymore, Jews. Not anymore.”
After his tweet, Flynn quickly apologized and said his message was a mistake. Nevertheless, the incident supported the notion floated by Flynn’s critics that he was an impulsive figure. In August, he would show this trait again when he visited a synagogue in Massachusetts and said Islam “is a vicious cancer inside the body of 1.7 billion people on this planet and it has to be excised.” Flynn’s words signaled to extremist white supremacists known online as the “alt-right” that he was with them. It was also perfect material for radical Muslim propagandists who sought to recruit support and even would-be terrorists by claiming the United States was hostile to Islam and committed to a modern version of the Crusades.16
Compared with the fire-breathing Flynn, whom GOP stalwart and retired general Colin Powell called “right-wing nutty,” Mike Pence was the campaign’s voice of tempered reason. When he spoke at the convention, he fell into the role he had been assigned, praising the presidential candidate while reassuring conservative Christians that it was all right for them to put a foulmouthed, twice-divorced, political bomb-thrower into the Oval Office. After beginning with the trusty refrain that “I’m a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican, in that order,” Pence reminded people of his long (and only) marriage to his wife, Karen, and described his children, Charlotte, Audrey, and Michael J. Pence, as “the three greatest kids in the world.” The state of Indiana and its Hoosiers came in for eight mentions, and he made the expected attacks on the opposition. But Pence’s main duty was to vouch for Trump, and he did, saying, “I’ve seen this good man up close, his utter lack of pretense, his respect for the people who work for him, and his devotion to his family.”
The GOP campaign would combine attacks on Hillary Clinton and her running mate, Virginia senator Tim Kaine, with declarations of support for various constituencies assumed to have suffered in recent years. Coal miners, factory workers, and others in the white working class were symbolic representatives of the Trump-Pence target voter, and they would be regarded as forgotten victims of Washington policies. “We have but one choice, and that man is ready,” said Pence. “This team is ready, our party is ready. And when we elect Donald Trump the forty-fifth president of the United States, together we will make America great again!”
Pence’s speech got rave reviews from the conservative press, and when the convention ended, he embarked on a fast-paced tour of the states where conservative Christians were key to the election. In the entire month of August, he visited only one Northeastern city, Manchester, New Hampshire, and never touched down on the West Coast. Instead, his itinerary took him to Iowa (five stops), Pennsylvania (five), and Ohio (four). Most of his events were in small- to medium-size cities. Compared with Trump’s raucous, stream-of-consciousness appearances where he lurched from the ridiculous to the profane but riveted both voters and the press, Pence was a conventional campaigner. He was so bland that when he appeared outside Toledo, Ohio, the local paper’s headline read, VP CANDIDATE PENCE GIVES CAMPAIGN SPEECH.17
Dutiful and patient, Pence offered nothing but support for Trump even when he suggested a President Hillary Clinton might be shot if she limited gun rights and encouraged Russian operatives to hack into his opponents’ computers. Pence held firm even when a videotape emerged with Donald Trump telling the host of a TV show called Access Hollywood that as a celebrity, he, Trump, could sexually harass and even grope women. “Grab ’em by the pussy,” he said. “You can do anything.”
The tape, which the Trump campaign initially dismissed as “locker room talk,” disgusted many Americans, including, according to Newsweek, Karen Pence. Quoting an unnamed former Pence aide, the magazine said Karen Pence considered Trump “reprehensible—just totally vile,” but a Pence spokeswoman denied that she had ever said such a thing.18 The New Yorker reported that the Pences refused to take Trump’s telephone calls and told him they needed to assess whether Mike would remain on the ticket. Pence issued a statement saying he was “offended” by what he heard on the tape. “I do not condone his remarks,” he said, “and cannot defend them.”
In private, Pence and GOP chairman Reince Priebus were said to have considered ways to force Trump to resign as the presidential candidate, leaving Pence to take his place. Such a move would have pleased those Republicans who identified themselves as “Never Trumpers,” but no workable mechanism existed to accomplish such a coup. People close to Pence denied that he ever had it in mind. “Once he signed on to the ticket with Trump, Mike knew what he was getting into,” one insider said. “He knew and he had to accept the way it was. Above all, he was loyal, and the talk of a deal with Reince was not true.”
Trump’s response to the revelation suggested that the reaction, whether it came from Pence or others, got to him. In a video message to the country, he said, “I’ve never said I’m a perfect person, nor pretended to be someone that I’m not. I’ve said and done things I regret, and the words released today on this more-than-a-decade-old video are one of them. Anyone who knows me knows these words don’t reflect who I am. I said it, I was wrong, and I apologize.” Trump ended this uncharacteristic statement—he almost never apologized—with a promise. “I pledge to be a better man tomorrow and will never, ever let you down.”
In the conservative Christian culture that Mike Pence knew, second chances were always available to repentant sinners, especially if they support the values and policies prized by members of the community. Pence had already anointed Trump in the eyes of this segment of the electorate, which meant there was almost nothing he couldn’t get away with just as long as he said he was sorry. Just to make sure, Pence went on television to vouch for him, telling CBS News, “What he’s made clear is that was talk, regrettable talk on his part, but that there were no actions, and he’s categorically denied these latest unsubstantiated allegations. The Donald Trump that I’ve come to know, that my family has come to know and spent a considerable amount of time with, is someone who has a long record of not only loving his family, lifting his family up, but employing and promoting women in positions of authority in his company,” he said.19
Whatever they themselves thought, Pence’s statement tied his wife and children to Trump. As the husband and father in a conservative Christian family, he was privileged to make such a choice and could expect that he would not be challenged once he did. In the meantime, a huge controversy erupted over the FBI’s revelation that emails mentioning Hillary Clinton were discovered on a computer belonging to disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner, who was being investigated for sending lewd images to a minor. Weiner’s wife, Huma Abedin, was a top Clinton aide.
Ultimately, Pence’s vice presidential campaign would be recalled for his deft ability to stand with and for a presidential candidate whose life amounted to one long repudiation of the morals Pence promoted. The high point was the one debate he had with the Democratic Party’s candidate for vice president, Tim Kaine. Wisconsin Republican governor Scott Walker helped Pence prepare for the debate by playing Kaine in rehearsals and Pence mastered the ability to deflect even the most difficult questions. For example, when asked in the debate why Trump had reneged on a promise to release his tax returns, Pence said, “He hasn’t broken his promise … Look, Donald Trump has filed over one hundred pages of financial disclosure, which is what the law requires. The American people can review that. And he’s going—Senator, he’s going to release his tax returns when the audit is over.” (Even two years later, Trump still had not released his tax returns.) Pence glossed over one of Trump’s most outrageous claims—that Mexico was sending drug dealers and rapists across the border—to justify building a wall along the boundary. Other debate distortions offered by Pence included his denial that Trump had called for the expansion of nuclear weapons to Saudi Arabia and Japan (he had) and the false claim that “less than ten cents on the dollar in the Clinton Foundation” went to charity (eighty-seven cents did); Pence also denied that Trump had praised Russia’s Vladimir Putin as a great leader. (Trump had said Putin was “a leader far more than our president [Obama] has been.”)
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From a fact-checker’s perspective, Pence’s performance was spotty at best, but people watching the debate were not equipped to test everything he said, and his calm demeanor reassured viewers that he might be a steadying influence on Trump. Watching at his home in Washington, Phil Sharp, the long-retired congressman who had soundly defeated Pence in Indiana, concluded that Kaine had lost within the first thirty minutes. “Pence had come a long way,” explained Sharp after the debate. “He wasn’t being truthful, but he looked and sounded calm and trustworthy. Kaine was too eager, too aggressive, and too wonky to connect with voters.”20
Late in the campaign, on October 24, Pence appeared before a group of right-wing Christian organizations called the Faith and Freedom Coalition, founded by Ralph Reed. After excoriating Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and liberalism in general, Pence turned to the justification for voting for Trump. “I’ve got to tell you,” he said, shaking his head. “This man, he’s a good father. He loves his family. And he loves this country. And he has a boundless faith in the American people, and I know he’ll be a great president of the United States of America. I’ve seen it up close. I’ve seen it up close.”
There was more: Pence had an intimate anecdote to share with the audience, as if he were standing at a backyard fence, chatting with decent folks who shared the same traditional values that those “others”—the Democrats—did not share. The time was the night after the Republican National Convention, said Pence. He then turned to his right in a bit of theater and gestured to Karen so that she could nod and acknowledge and recall the moment.
“Donald and I talked about the importance of prayer in our family life,” Pence began. “We talked with them warmly and personally about that. And that night, he just happened to say to me as he walked by, he said, ‘Before we break up tomorrow, could we have a little time for prayer?’ And I said, ‘Sure.’ And the next morning, we were on the plane. And we did one stop and we were getting ready to go, and sure enough, he came out from the back of the plane where he’d gone to freshen up and he said, ‘Can we pray?’ And we grabbed hands and bowed heads, and I asked Karen to pray on our departure as we both begin to go and make our way on this cause to the American people—it was a precious moment, but a tender moment.”
Notorious for his sins of the flesh, Trump the politician had tried to demonstrate some Christian bona fides before. Early in the campaign, when asked if he sought God’s forgiveness, he had clumsily referenced Communion, saying, “When I drink my little wine—which is about the only wine I drink—and have my little cracker, I guess that is a form of asking for forgiveness, and I do that as often as possible because I feel cleansed.” With Pence at his side, Trump could leap to the head of the Sunday school class.
After the audience applauded, Pence said he was certain of victory. “I truly do believe that at particular moments in the life of this nation, the American people have risen up to demand government as good as our people, and this is such a time. The American people are rising up, and they will elect this good man, and we will make America great again together.”
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On Election Day, November 8, 2016, Mike Pence awoke in Indianapolis at the governor’s mansion and went for a bike ride with Karen. They wore gym clothes and helmets. After the ride, they spent time in the mansion, emerging just before noon to cross the street to vote at St. Thomas Aquinas Church, where Karen joked, “You got my vote.” Mike said he felt “humbled” by the experience of voting. Later in the day, he, Karen, and some family members flew to New York to await the election returns at the Hilton Midtown Hotel. The tide turned in favor of the Republicans early in the evening, but Trump waited to speak until Hillary Clinton’s concession and phone call well after midnight. He stood before supporters at around 3:00 A.M. and delivered a speech designed to sound duly presidential. “Now it’s time to bind the wounds of division,” Trump read. “To all Republicans and Democrats and independents across this nation, I say it is time for us to come together as one united people.”
Pence and his family entourage cheered, and Mike went around to embrace each of them. Pence and family left the celebration before dawn on November 9. In the hours to come, he would appear to be much calmer and more confident than the president-elect. Chris Christie, previously named chairman of the transition, had been gathering names and résumés for several months. Now that the dream was a reality, Trump would have to work quickly to assemble a government, but neither he nor Christie seemed ready to make many decisions.