Former Vice President Mike Pence announced Wednesday he’s running for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination as he delivered his toughest takedown to date of primary rival and former boss Donald Trump, who he said “should never” be president again for his actions in the aftermath of the 2020 election.
At his formal campaign kickoff in Ankeny, Iowa, Pence recalled how Trump had asked him to block the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 election win as Pence presided over Congress on January 6, 2021.
“The American people deserve to know, on that day, President Trump also demanded I choose between him and the Constitution. Now voters will be faced with the same choice. I chose the Constitution, and I always will,” Pence said to applause from the crowd at Des Moines Area Community College.
“I believe that anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be president of the United States. And anyone who asks someone else to put them over the Constitution should never be president of the United States again,” the former vice president said of his onetime boss, currently the front-runner for the 2024 GOP nomination.
In remarks that ran a little over half an hour, Pence, who had been a loyal second-in-command to Trump prior to January 6, maintained that he was “incredibly proud” of the Trump-Pence administration’s “accomplishments,” before explaining why he was challenging his onetime ticket mate.
“The former president continues to insist that I had the right to overturn the election. President Trump was wrong then, and he is wrong now. I will always believe, by God’s grace, I did my duty on that day, I kept my oath, to ensure the peaceful transfer of power under the Constitution and the laws of this country,” he said.
Read more about his campaign launch here.
Source: www.cnn.com