EPTTwo weeks ago, when I spoke to Anthony Scaramucci, the former White House communications director—the same conversation in which he pilloried several colleagues, threatened to fire his entire staff, and claimed to have called the F.B.I. to investigate the White House chief of staff—he offered some cryptic thoughts about Vice-President Mike Pence. “Why do you think Nick’s there, bro?” Scaramucci asked me, referring to Nick Ayers, Pence’s recently installed chief of staff. “Are you stupid?” He continued, “Why is Nick there? Nick’s there to protect the Vice-President because the Vice-President can’t believe what the fuck is going on.” Given everything else Scaramucci told me that day, I left this exchange out of my original article about the conversation. But, in light of the news this week about Pence’s political machinations, the remarks seem worth revisiting.
On Saturday, the Times, citing conversations with seventy-five Republicans, reported that two of Pence’s aides, including Ayers, have told other Republicans that the Vice-President, in the words of the Times, “wants to be ready” to run for President in 2020 in case the opportunity arises.
In the complicated relationship between a President and his Vice-President, nothing is more sensitive than a Vice-President angling to replace the boss, and Pence’s response to the Times article was furious. He called the piece “disgraceful and offensive to me, my family, and our entire team” and labelled the allegations it contained—without being specific—“categorically false.” It was “laughable and absurd,” the Vice-President said, to think that he wasn’t committed to Trump’s reëlection.
But what did Scaramucci mean when he told me that Pence couldn’t “believe” what was going on? And what was he getting at when he asked me to think about why Ayers had been hired? At the time, I took his reference to what was “going on” to mean the general dysfunction in the White House. But, as the Times noted over the weekend, Ayers’s appointment was “a striking departure from vice presidents’ long history of elevating a government veteran to be their top staff member. Mr. Ayers had worked on many campaigns but never in the federal government.” Was Scaramucci suggesting that Ayers was meant to protect Pence from the fallout if and when Trump collapses politically, resigns, decides not to run for reëlection, or is impeached? (Scaramucci did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.)
This is treacherous ground for any Vice-President. During Bill Clinton’s impeachment, Al Gore was extremely careful to avoid any activities that might have been interpreted as supporting Clinton’s ouster. He had deep reservations about Clinton’s personal conduct with Monica Lewinsky, but even privately he was steadfast in his support and rarely vented about how he felt about the President’s mistakes, lest his true feelings leak out and inadvertently fuel the impeachment effort. “As he understood his responsibilities, unconditional support was his only option,” John F. Harris writes in “The Survivor,” an account of Clinton’s Presidency.
Publicly, Pence has shown nothing but unconditional—at times even obsequious and worshipful—support for Trump. His private actions, however, suggest a more calculating and realistic mind-set. But would Pence be able to survive a Trump collapse?
I reached out to Ron Klain, Gore’s chief of staff when he was Vice-President, to ask about how Gore dealt with the complexities of serving loyally as Vice-President for someone who might be booted out of office. He was reluctant to compare Pence’s situation with Gore’s, but he did, however, make it clear that any attempt by Pence to escape Trump’s shadow would be met with a withering argument from Democrats.
“While some of what Vice-President Pence is doing differs from what his predecessors did, I don’t find it particularly extraordinary,” Klain told me. “Over all, I would say that whenever Mike Pence runs for office in the future, the liability he will carry from this period is not how he distanced himself from Trump but, rather, how he deepened his ties to the President. In 2020, at the end of a failed, one-term Trump Presidency, no amount of pac money or donor meetings will insulate Vice-President Pence from the political fallout from being Donald Trump’s transition chief, Capitol Hill liaison, right-hand man, and principal surrogate.” It’s a difficult logic to argue with.
On Saturday, the Times, citing conversations with seventy-five Republicans, reported that two of Pence’s aides, including Ayers, have told other Republicans that the Vice-President, in the words of the Times, “wants to be ready” to run for President in 2020 in case the opportunity arises.
In the complicated relationship between a President and his Vice-President, nothing is more sensitive than a Vice-President angling to replace the boss, and Pence’s response to the Times article was furious. He called the piece “disgraceful and offensive to me, my family, and our entire team” and labelled the allegations it contained—without being specific—“categorically false.” It was “laughable and absurd,” the Vice-President said, to think that he wasn’t committed to Trump’s reëlection.
But what did Scaramucci mean when he told me that Pence couldn’t “believe” what was going on? And what was he getting at when he asked me to think about why Ayers had been hired? At the time, I took his reference to what was “going on” to mean the general dysfunction in the White House. But, as the Times noted over the weekend, Ayers’s appointment was “a striking departure from vice presidents’ long history of elevating a government veteran to be their top staff member. Mr. Ayers had worked on many campaigns but never in the federal government.” Was Scaramucci suggesting that Ayers was meant to protect Pence from the fallout if and when Trump collapses politically, resigns, decides not to run for reëlection, or is impeached? (Scaramucci did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.)
This is treacherous ground for any Vice-President. During Bill Clinton’s impeachment, Al Gore was extremely careful to avoid any activities that might have been interpreted as supporting Clinton’s ouster. He had deep reservations about Clinton’s personal conduct with Monica Lewinsky, but even privately he was steadfast in his support and rarely vented about how he felt about the President’s mistakes, lest his true feelings leak out and inadvertently fuel the impeachment effort. “As he understood his responsibilities, unconditional support was his only option,” John F. Harris writes in “The Survivor,” an account of Clinton’s Presidency.
Publicly, Pence has shown nothing but unconditional—at times even obsequious and worshipful—support for Trump. His private actions, however, suggest a more calculating and realistic mind-set. But would Pence be able to survive a Trump collapse?
I reached out to Ron Klain, Gore’s chief of staff when he was Vice-President, to ask about how Gore dealt with the complexities of serving loyally as Vice-President for someone who might be booted out of office. He was reluctant to compare Pence’s situation with Gore’s, but he did, however, make it clear that any attempt by Pence to escape Trump’s shadow would be met with a withering argument from Democrats.
“While some of what Vice-President Pence is doing differs from what his predecessors did, I don’t find it particularly extraordinary,” Klain told me. “Over all, I would say that whenever Mike Pence runs for office in the future, the liability he will carry from this period is not how he distanced himself from Trump but, rather, how he deepened his ties to the President. In 2020, at the end of a failed, one-term Trump Presidency, no amount of pac money or donor meetings will insulate Vice-President Pence from the political fallout from being Donald Trump’s transition chief, Capitol Hill liaison, right-hand man, and principal surrogate.” It’s a difficult logic to argue with.
Source
