Photo Credit: Office of the Governor of Indiana
The Indianapolis Star is confirming that Indiana Governor Mike Pence is suspending his re-election campaign. That pretty much points to him being GOP presumptive nominee Donald Trump’s choice for Vice President. That doesn’t mean it’s “official”, but the official announcement will come tomorrow at 11a.
Former Speaker and Georgia Congressman Newt Gingrich had been named as a top contender for the Vice Presidential slot on the Republican ticket, but it looks like Trump is trying to bolster his social conservative credentials with evangelicals with a Pence pick.
It seems that the GOP will has amp’d up the social issues game this go around with proposed planks in the Republican platform including things like all but declaring war on pornography and rejecting gay rights language that was being pushed by more moderate Republicans. The Governor’s stance on RFRA and other social issues may help get hold outs backing Senator Ted Cruz on board the Trump Train.
Governor Pence appears to be a cool head who could potentially balance out Donald Trump’s “foot-in-mouth” disorder. This may help ease the minds of Republican faithful (and independents) that a cool head may prevail in a Trump administration. I can only hope that Governor Pence will be handed the keys of Trump’s personal Twitter account (and hides them) and keeps him from tweeting silliness.
Jon mentioned earlier today of a poll that possibly puts the state of Georgia in the Democratic column. Would an 11th hour picking Newt over Governor Pence help keep Georgia Republican in November? Potentially. Newt won over 50% of the vote in 2012 (compared to Trump’s 39%), and he’s still fairly popular among Georgia Republicans. Will it happen? Probably not.
Now, that doesn’t mean that Trump won’t have Newt in his administration, but it won’t have the same panache to the average voter as “Trump/Gingrich 2016”.
We’re still months away from November. With Hillary continuing to slide in the polls, hopefully the Trump and his campaign will actually make movement to gain ground. Will Pence cause Republicans to move off the fence and back Trump? We’ll see. Currently, RealClearPolitics has the no toss-ups race at 328 for Clinton and 210 for Trump. Let’s hope we don’t cause ourselves continued harm by making the Republican National Convention a sideshow.