This week, former President Trump asked his former running mate and vice president to back him.
Earlier in the day, while giving a speech at the GOP Jewish Coalition Conference in the city of Las Vegas, Nevada, former Vice President Mike Pence announced the suspension of his presidential campaign.
Trump stated, “People are walking away now, and they are all supporting me. I’m not sure about Mike Pence. He should back me up. He should back me up. Do you know why? He was vice president during my very successful term. He should back me up. I picked him and made him vice president, but politicians are known to be very unfaithful.”
“It is not my time to be the leader of the country,” Pence stated to the crowd during his speech. He also promised to “never abandon the fight for republican values.” Even though he didn’t back anyone, he told Republicans to keep away from following the “siren song of populism.”
“We always understood this would be hard, but I don’t feel bad about it,” Pence informed the crowd. “If we hadn’t tried at all, then it would have been even harder than failing.”
As shown by the RealClearPolitics average of surveys, Pence’s average was only 3.5%, which is a long way behind Trump’s average of 59.1%. He came in fifth place in the polls, behind Trump, Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, a former U.N. ambassador, and Vivek Ramaswamy, a tech entrepreneur.
Trump asked Pence to support him during his second speech in Las Vegas this past week. He spoke during the Republican Jewish Coalition event right after Pence, but he didn’t talk about his former vice president’s campaign suspension at that event. Fox News says that DeSantis spoke right after Pence and also didn’t respond to what the former vice president said, but he did make a statement later.
From 2017 to 2021, Pence was Trump’s vice president. Their relationship seemed to be getting worse before what happened on January 6, 2021. Since then, both Trump and Pence have fired shots at one another.
During his speech to the Republican Jewish Coalition, Trump made reference to Michigan entrepreneur Perry Johnson and conservative talk radio presenter Larry Elder when he declared that “everyone that leaves” the race was supporting him. After putting his presidential bid on hold just a few days ago, Elder backed Trump, stating that Trump’s “leadership has proven instrumental in promoting conservative, America-first values.”
A couple of weeks ago, Johnson quit the race. In a statement last week, he backed Trump, claiming that he is the only contender capable of “beating Joe Biden at election time and providing an answer to our nation’s economic, foreign policy, as well as social problems.”
