Highlights: To watch Pence on the trail these days is to see a man navigating the awkward, abrupt transition from being next in the line of presidential succession just four years ago to backbencher status among the Republican field. You can see him grapple with his own political mortality, working it out in public.

Since disclosing that he has just $1.2 million cash left, alongside more than $620,000 in debt, Pence’s presidential campaign has not said whether he has qualified for the third debate in Miami next month; he’s reached the polling minimum but not the donor threshold.

Nearly six months into his presidential campaign, and fewer than 90 days until the Iowa caucuses, Pence is not seeing massive crowds like his former running mate Donald Trump, or his fellow Midwesterner Vivek Ramaswamy, or Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, or even his longtime frenemy, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. Thirty folks at Penn Drug store in Sidney on a recent Friday morning; another 30 at the Olive Branch Restaurant in Greenfield that afternoon; 60 at a senior center in Glenwood the next day. Nor is he seeing anything but single-digit backing in polls. In Iowa, he’s currently averaging just 2.6 percent among Republican voters.

It’s difficult to find a political prognosticator who is not on his payroll who gives Pence any plausible shot at winning the nomination, a reality he acknowledged on the trail earlier this month. “The media has already decided how all this is going to end,” he told just 13 people at a Pizza Ranch in Red Oak.

  • @Buffalox@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Mike Pence is pretty far out there, as in he is pretty crazy on many points.
    But that’s not crazy enough for modern Republicans. Today you need to be bat shit insane to have a chance as a republican.

    • dual_sport_dork 🐧🗡️
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      481 year ago

      That, and the Trump sycophants now want his head because they somehow believe that he had the ability to nullify the 2020 election and place Trump in the presidency, which he did not do – for reasons that are blatantly obvious to anyone else.

      • @Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        341 year ago

        Yes as in Republican is the one true religion, if you don’t have 100% faith even against evidence, you are a heretic.
        Republican is not about politics anymore, it’s a cult. A death cult to be precise.

      • @Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        101 year ago

        Yes, and that’s pretty insane IMO. All the same “values” as a Russian totalitarian. I bet Russians are super happy with Putin’s shitshow, and Republicans want the same for USA!

    • @danc4498@lemmy.world
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      31 year ago

      He was a nobody until trump came along. Then he stood up to trump. Now he’s a nobody without trump.

      • spaceghoti
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        41 year ago

        Surprisingly, no. Pence established himself in the House in years past. He had a good relationship with Capitol Hill until Trump disavowed him. Now he’s nobody because the base despise him for his perceived betrayal.