Mike Pence won't be the 2024 candidate...

 

Mike Pence. White House photo. 

Mike Pence was booed during a testy exchange with Tucker Carlson at a conservative event over his support of Ukraine. The Hill. Pence has emerged as one of the main supporters of the Ukraine war in GOP field as opposed to Donald Trump who is opposed to the war and Ron DeSantis who questions it. Pence was booed as he again voiced his support of sending more weapons to Ukraine. Carlson, who is also a critic of the Ukraine War, was cheered when he asked if Pence was concerned about the sorry state of America and Pence answered "that's not my concern" and said America could be both a leader of the free world as well as improving things at home. Carlson also pushed the religious Pence on Ukraine's discrimination of Russian religious minorities in the country with Pence saying he pushed Zelenskyy on the issue the last time he met with him. 

Tucker: "I'm sorry, Mr. Vice President. You are distressed that the Ukrainians don't have enough American tanks? Every city in the United States has become much worse over the past three years. Drive around. There's not one city that's gotten better. And it's visible. Our… pic.twitter.com/6bJ8aKSPhs

— TheBlaze (@theblaze) July 14, 2023

My Comment: 

The Hill is downplaying how big of a gaffe Pence made here by not mentioning the fact that he said that "That's not my concern" after Tucker Carlson pushed him on the issue. It is a horrible own goal to essentially say you care more about Ukraine than the suffering of the American people. He attempted to recover afterwards (you can see it in the full Twitter clip above) but it was probably too late. 

It was a real "let them eat cake" move by Pence and one that anti-war media is going to have a field day with. A lot of them probably won't show Pence trying to recover, which I am glad that I was able to do. I don't like Pence anymore (especially now that he has gone full-Ukraine war) but we should still be fair to him. 

I do get the feeling that Pence actually believes in the Ukraine war, which is more than a little scary. Skepticism of the war is growing on the right and Pence isn't likely to get a boost in the polls from this. There are a few people on the right that still support the war but the top three non-Pence candidates, Trump, DeSantis and Ramaswamy are all generally opposed to continuing the war and that represents about 75% of the GOP. And not everyone that doesn't support those candidates is pro-war, some are just anti-Trump. It's not a winning issue for Pence and if he was smart he would back down. 

Unfortunately, Pence did the opposite in the worst way possible. Everyone who is concerned that America is spending so much on Ukraine at the expense of everything else is not going to be happy with Pence's attitude here. They just heard that Pence is not concerned with there issues and that is not going to be a good move for him. 

As for Tucker Carlson I think this was a good move for him. Calling out Pence like this did help advance the cause of peace in Ukraine, which is obviously something Carlson cares about. From what I understand Carlson did a good job pressing candidates on his core issues and he may have ensured that Pence isn't the candidate. 

Indeed, Pence probably sensed a trap from Carlson and was annoyed that he was even asked the question, which may explain his flippant attitude.  But Pence is an experienced politician and should have been a lot smarter than this. I don't know how his campaign can recover...