Tag: Mike Pence

Pence’s security detail raises eyebrows in peaceful Iceland

Washington Post logoLocals were reportedly urged to show “patience and understanding” for the visit.

Vice President Pence and his extensive security detail raised eyebrows on Wednesday as they traveled through the capital city of Iceland, a famously peaceful country where its president travels alone on private errands.

Pence was the first U.S. vice president to visit Iceland since George H.W. Bush went to Reykjavik in 1983, similarly causing a stir with his “attendant paraphernalia of Air Force Two, bulletproof limousines and White House telecommunication equipment,” The Washington Post reported at the time.

Weeks before Pence’s visit, Secret Service personnel were seen in the city scouting out locations, the Associated Press reported. Bomb-sniffing dogs were given special clearance to enter the country, and police officers from outside the capital were sent in to help the Reykjavik police meet security standards set by the United States. During the visit Wednesday, U.S. security personnel — who had to be given special permission to bear arms — trailed the vice president through the city. When Pence met with Icelandic officials, snipers were seen perched on the rooftops of nearby buildings, the AP wrote.

View the complete September 5 article by Rebecca Tan on The Washington Post website here.

Trump denies ever suggesting that Pence stay at a Trump-owned hotel in Ireland

Washington Post logoPresident Trump on Wednesday denied ever telling Vice President Pence or Attorney General William P. Barr to use his family-owned properties, but defended them for choosing “the best.”

The president was responding to questions about Pence’s decision to stay at Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, Ireland, while meeting with Irish leaders in Dublin this week, a more than 140-mile commute.

“I had no involvement, other than it’s a great place,” Trump said. “It wasn’t my idea for Mike to go there.”

View the complete September 4 article by Colby Itkowitz and David A. Fahrenthold on The Washington Post website here.

Pence lands in controversy with stay at Trump hotel

The Hill logoVice President Pence’s office is engulfed in controversy set off by his two-night stay in Ireland at one of President Trump’s family properties.

Pence stayed at Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg on Ireland’s west coast despite his meetings the same day in Dublin, which is on Ireland’s east side and 182 miles away.

The curious decision also came with a shifting story about why Pence ended up at Trump’s property in Doonbeg.

View the complete September 4 article by Brett Samuels and Morgan Chalfant on The Hill website here.

Irish journalist says Pence’s visit was so offensive it was as if he ‘s**t on the new carpet’

AlterNet logoVice President Mike Pence has completed a two-day visit to the Republican of Ireland, where he met with Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, President Michael D. Higgins and other officials. During his visit, Pence (who is Irish-American) spoke in glowing terms about his Irish ancestry. But Miriam Lord, a columnist for the Irish Times, was not impressed — and on Tuesday, she delivered a scathing critique of Pence’s visit to her country.

Ireland is two separate countries: Northern Ireland is part of the U.K., while the Republic of Ireland to the south is not. Residents of Ireland have been worried about how a hard Brexit could affect them, as the Republic of Ireland is on the euro and plans to remain in the European Union (EU).

Lord notes that Pence, like President Donald Trump, is a strong supporter of Brexit and was on his way to meet with U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson when he was in Ireland. And in her column, she takes Pence to task for the pro-Johnson comments he made during his meeting with Irish officials.

View the complete September 4 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Trump encouraged Pence to stay at his golf resort in Ireland Add to list

Washington Post logoDOONBEG, Ireland — Vice President Pence arrived Monday in Ireland with an unusual itinerary: He would attend meetings with Irish leaders in Dublin during the day Tuesday — but spend two nights on the opposite side of the country, at a golf club owned by President Trump.

Pence spent both Monday and Tuesday nights at Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, in a small town on Ireland’s southwest coast, returning to the village after meetings with Ireland’s top elected officials.

Pence defended that decision — which required him to fly to Dublin and back on Air Force Two — by saying that he wanted to visit Doonbeg so that he could have dinner with his family at Morrissey’s, a pub here owned by a distant cousin.

View the complete September 3 article by Robert Costa, David A. Fahrenthold and John Wagner on The Washington Post website here.

Trump encouraged Pence to stay at his golf resort in Ireland

Washington Post logoDOONBEG, Ireland — Vice President Pence arrived Monday in Ireland with an unusual itinerary: He would attend meetings with Irish leaders in Dublin during the day Tuesday — but spend two nights on the opposite side of the country, at a golf club owned by President Trump.

Pence spent both Monday and Tuesday nights at Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, in a small town on Ireland’s southwest coast, returning to the village after meetings with Ireland’s top elected officials.

Pence defended that decision — which required him to fly to Dublin and back on Air Force Two — by saying that he wanted to visit Doonbeg so that he could have dinner with his family at Morrissey’s, a pub here owned by a distant cousin.

View the complete September 3 article by Robert Costa, David A. Fahrenthold and John Wagner on The Washington Post website here.

Pence’s funny math on Green New Deal, Medicare-for-all costs

Washington Post logo“You know, watching the debate the other night, with all the Democrat candidates standing so far on the left, I thought that debate stage was going to flip over. … In fact, if you add up every budget-busting proposal they offer — from Medicare-for-all and the Green New Deal — it would actually cost every household in America over $900,000 over the next 10 years.”

— Vice President Pence, in remarks at the Detroit Economic Club, Aug. 19, 2019

Pence said every U.S. household would have to pay $900,000 over the next decade to cover the cost of Medicare-for-all and the Green New Deal.

The median U.S. household income was $61,372 in 2017, so the vice president is making one of those huge, scary claims that immediately draws our attention — and skepticism.

We’ve never seen such an exorbitant estimate. Pence is saying these two Democratic proposals would cost more than $100 trillion, or roughly five times the national debt.

Four Pinocchios

View the complete August 22 article by Salvador Rizzo on The Washington Post website here.

International programs favored by Ivanka Trump and Mike Pence will be spared by federal budget cuts: report

AlterNet logoPresident Donald Trump has been calling for extensive cuts to foreign aid programs. But on Monday, a senior Trump Administration official told Roll Call that that programs favored by Vice President Mike Pence and White House adviser Ivanka Trump will not be affected by a package of foreign aid cuts.

President Trump is “not going to touch those,” the anonymously quoted official told Roll Call.

The foreign spending package would include cuts to U.S. State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development programs. But the programs that will survive the cuts, according to Roll Call, will include programs that promote women’s economic development in other countries (an Ivanka Trump favorite) and programs to protect Christians from persecution in other countries (a Mike Pence favorite).

View the complete August 13 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Pence’s deputy press secretary makes mind-boggling argument that Elaine Chao is a better immigrant than Ilhan Omar

AlterNet logoDuring a “Make America Great Again” rally in North Carolina on Wednesday night, President Donald Trump doubled down on his racist assertion that four congresswomen of color should leave the United States and reiterated his disdain for Somali-born Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota while the crowd chanted, “Send her back, send her back.” Trump’s critics have been pointing out that prominent Republicans such as First Lady Melania Trump and Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao are immigrants — and Vice President Mike Pence’s deputy press secretary, Darin Miller, is responding with a mind-boggling claim that Chao is a good immigrant while Omar is not.

Mother Jones’ Matt Cohen is reporting that he received an e-mail from Miller stating that while Chao (who is originally from Mainland China and is married to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell) “worked hard and assimilated” after coming to the United States, Omar “seems content to criticize America at every turn.”

Miller, according to Cohen, wrote to the Mother Jones reporter to explain that he believed he misconstrued comments that Marc Short, Pence’s chief of staff, made during a Fox News appearance on Monday. Short, defending Trump, insisted that the president can’t have “racist motives” because he appointed a Chinese immigrant to an important position in his administration.

View the complete July 18 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

‘No shower, no shower!’: Migrants’ shouts greet Pence as he visits Texas detention centers

The vice president saw detainees packed into their holding areas surrounded by chain-link fence.

Vice President Mike Pence saw firsthand the extreme overcrowding migrants are often forced to endure at federal detention centers when he visited two Friday in Texas.

Agents wore face masks, and video showed detainees packed into their holding areas surrounded by chain-link fence, the concrete floors littered with silver thermal blankets. Reporters accompanying Pence described the facility as smelling “horrendous.”

A group of men detained behind chain link fencing shouted to news cameras, “No shower, no shower!”

View the complete July 12 article by Dennis Romero on the NBC News website here.