What Will A Mike Pence Presidency Look Like.? A Detailed Look At The (Possible) Future President Of The United States...

With all the turmoil presently engulfing the Donald Trump white house and the very real potential for the House of Representatives to begin impeachment proceedings - or the possibility that when faced with overwhelming evidence acquired through Robert Muller’s Special Counsel investigation, President Trump will resign in disgrace…

…I decided I would take a look at the possibility of a Mike Pence Presidency.

Mike Pence’s biography is actually quite impressive, it contains everything you would expect (and hope) to see in a modern presidential candidate. After receiving his BA in American History from Hanover College in 1981, and law degree from Indiana University School of Law in 1986, he started his own firm and began practicing law. Within two years his political ambitions became evident and he made his first attempt to acquire public office. In 1988, he ran for the US House of Representatives in the Indiana 2nd district against Philip R. Sharp. The 1988 election ended with Pence losing to Sharp, as did the second attempt in 1990.

By the time Pence was finally successful getting elected to congress in 2000, his political, social, and religious ideology had become clear. Over the previous decade, 1990 to 2000, he founded the “Indiana Policy Review Foundation”, and hosted a popular TV show “The Mike Pence Show”, where he developed many of his still present Ideologies, and the perfect platform to sharpen his political skills.

In many interviews throughout his career, Pence describes himself as “a christian, a conservative, and a republican, in that order”, and that has been supported by his actions over the years. In 1998, long after the dangers of cigarette smoking had been confirmed many times over, Pence famously wrote (or more accurately stated – infamously wrote) “time for a quick reality check, smoking doesn’t kill”, and held to that position far beyond all of his republican counterparts – verifying to the big tobacco companies - and anyone else, he would do their bidding regardless of public pressure - or facts. Throughout his career as a congressman, Pence defiantly opposed his own party on issues that would eventually become the Republican Party signature programs – programs like “No Child Left Behind”, and “Medicare Part D” prescription drug benefits, to name just two, but the list goes on and on.

Mike Pence has time and again used public platforms to shamelessly promote his religious beliefs on many of the most controversial issues confronting America today. From abortion, to LGBT rights, to civil liberties, to school lunches - there is very little doubt Pence’s religiosity plays a major role in his decision making process. During his 12-year congressional career however, he actually left very little mark on the institution: he introduced 90 bills and resolutions - none became law.

Mike Pence’s Biography:
https://www.biography.com/people/mike-pence-071416

 Candidate, United States House of Representatives, 1988, 1990
 Representative, United States House of Representatives, 2000-2012
 Governor, State of Indiana, 2012-2017
 President, United States Senate, 2017-present
 Vice President, United States of America, 2017-present

 Admissions Counselor, Hanover College, 1981-1983
 Attorney, Private Practice, 1986-1990
 President, Indiana Policy Review Foundation, 1991-1994
 Talk Show Host, Network Indiana, 1994-2000
 Chair, House Republican Study Committee, 2005-2007
 Former Member, Tea Party Caucus
 Former Chair, House Republican Conference
 Former Member, Congressional Task Force Against Anti-Semitism
 Member, Congressional Internet Caucus

Although this not only applies to politicians, but it is especially relevant concerning them – the very first thing you have to look at to determine intent, cause, and direction, is always “follow the money”. Whenever you want to determine why a politician does the things they do, look at who is giving them there funding. Combine the source of Mike Pence’s financing with his known political and religious ideology, and you can be reasonably certain of the who, what, when, where, and why concerning his political direction.

The following is a list of financial contributions made to Mike Pence, broken down into three sections – Top Sectors, a few of the top industries, the top twenty five contributors, and a summary. This information can go a long way to revealing his motivations.
https://www.followthemoney.org/ - (this does not include PAC and Super PAC contributions)
Top Sectors:

 $3,201,242.07 Ideology/Single Issue
 $2,792,606.31 Uncoded
 $2,059,048.04 General Business
 $1,565,408.46 Finance, Insurance & Real Estate
 $1,075,159.68 Construction
 $976,645.25 Health
 $682,828.28 Lawyers & Lobbyists
 $608,192.75 Energy & Natural Resources
 $505,661.92 Transportation
 $396,807.00 Agriculture
 $277,397.87 Candidate Contributions
 $268,473.00 Government Agencies/Education/Other
 $217,855.83 Communications & Electronics
 $22,200.00 Defense
 $21,580.66 Party

Top Industries:

 $3,176,972.00 Conservative Policy Organization
 $2,768,166.31 Uncoded
 $682,828.28 Lawyers and Lobbyists
 $632,158.71 Securities and Investments
 $510,508.41 Real Estate
 $485,491.88 Business Services
 $444,887.68 Construction Services
 $371,222.00 General Contractors
 $359,542.02 Chemical and Related Manufacturing
 $359,454.68 Pharmaceuticals & Health Products
 $329,289.54 Health Professionals
 $267,746.39 Miscellaneous Manufacturing & Distributing
 $212,411.00 Retired
 $209,295.00 Candidate Contributions
 $194,542.20 Hospitals & Nursing Homes
 $189,376.75 Electric Utilities
 $186,745.94 Miscellaneous Services
 $174,188.43 Beer, Wine & Liquor
 $161,000.00 Miscellaneous Transport
 $145,500.00 Mining
 $143,550.00 Building Materials & Equipment
 $142,910.00 Retail Sales
 $141,125.00 Automotive
 $138,700.00 Business Associations
 $126,707.00 Forestry & Forest Products
 $123,500.00 Trucking
 $121,850.00 Commercial Banks
 $115,500.00 Special Trade Contractors
 $115,125.00 Oil & Gas
 $107,600.00 Food & Beverage
 $100,689.48 Electronics Manufacturing & Services

Top Contributors:

 $3,071,972.00 REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS ASSOCIATION
 $350,000.00 WHITE, DEAN
 $275,634.52 MORAVEC, ANTHONY J
 $175,000.00 ERIC HOLCOMB CAMPAIGN CMTE
 $150,000.00 DEGEORGE, LAWRENCE F
 $138,000.00 NORTHEAST INDIANA FOR BETTER GOVERNMENT
 $125,000.00 BRYAN, JOHN D
 $116,329.54 REED, STUART
 $102,500.00 GAITHER, JEFFREY
 $100,000.00 KOCH, DAVID HAMILTON
 $100,000.00 SINQUEFIELD, REX A
 $100,000.00 SCHNATTER, JOHN H
 $95,000.00 CHAGRIN EXECUTIVE OFFICES
 $93,913.41 INDIANA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS
 $90,000.00 JOYCE, CHARLES P
 $82,189.48 KLIPSCH, FRED S
 $81,000.00 ASSOCIATED BUILDERS & CONTRACTORS INDIANA / KENTUCKY
 $79,287.42 BOSE MCKINNEY & EVANS
 $76,000.00 LUCAS, CHARLOTTE M
 $75,000.00 FOSTER, PAUL L
 $72,000.00 CONNER, WILLIS RICHARD
 $70,000.00 HERZOG, STANLEY M (Stan)
 $70,000.00 PFAU JR, NORMAN E (NED)
 $70,000.00 HOLDEN, MARK R
 $66,660.25 BARNES & THORNBURG

Summary:

 $8,310,494.37 In-State
 $6,360,612.75 Out-Of-State
 $21,580.66 Party Committee
 $277,397.87 Personal Funds
 $7,395,470.77 Individual Contributions
 $2,792,606.31 Other
 $14,671,107.12 From 12,759 Total Contributins

(This is one of the places where steemit fails me - formatting ability sucks. I had a total accounting of finances here but cant resize or chart within the post)

Over the course of his political career, as a congressman, and as the governor of Indiana, Mike Pence has taken contributions from pretty much every special interest one would expect from a mainstream Republican politician. No one should be surprised that many (if not all) of the votes he has cast, and bills he has supported, were either directly a result of, or indirectly influenced by special interests or religious ideology. He is not unique in this, I would wager practically every member of the House and Senate have comparable records of accepting contributions in exchange for influence, regardless of party affiliation.

The question now becomes, what insight into Pence’s future political direction can we extract from the financial data? Any single piece of information on its own is basically useless to determine what decisions he will make in the future considering there is very little separating him from the rest of the herd – so to speak. The political contributions (AKA bribes) are made to every politician as part of normal day to day operations, and some interests make it policy to donate to both sides in any given election in order to guarantee influence - regardless of who actually wins the race.

To make any accurate, informed predictions, it's necessary to combine the available financial data with his voting record as a state representative and as a governor. Unfortunately I was unable to find the exact dates of individual contributions in order to correlate them to specific votes or specific bills, but it is possible to gain a great deal of insight into voting behavior using the available information.

What we can expect if and when Mike Pence becomes President of the United States:

Regarding Abortion:

Based on his strong religious beliefs (also considering a large portion of his funding comes from religious organizations), combined with previous voting record, we can expect a President Pence to make a strong effort to severely limit abortions, and/or attempt to overturn the Roe Vs Wade Supreme Court decision and make abortions illegal altogether. Pence has stated on multiple occasions that Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal subsidies should be expressly prohibited from being used on abortion procedures. Barring the single exception that abortions should only be permitted when the life of the woman is endangered, Mr. Pence has expressed his desire to make abortion illegal regardless of the following circumstances:

 Abortions should be illegal even if it is preformed within the first trimester.
 Expressly prohibit dilation and extraction or "partial-birth" abortion procedures.
 Abortions should be illegal even when a pregnancy is the result of incest or rape.
 Abortions should be illegal even if the child will be born severely impaired or deformed.

The following is a summary of bills that Mike Pence has voted on during his tenure as an Indiana state representative. All of them are either directly and/or indirectly related to the abortion and women’s right to choose issue. It is important to keep in mind that regardless of the outcome of a bill – weather or not it passed or failed, the way he voted (Yea-Nea) gives us insight into what we can expect if and when Mike Pence becomes President of the United States:
https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/34024/mike-pence/2/abortion#.WcQRotQwhH0

Regarding Education:

Determining how Mr. Pence will vote on education is not as straight forward as the abortion issue. There are a limited number of congressional votes to draw from, and interviews give mixed Indications which principles he will support (if any) regarding education. Most data tends to favor his overall support of the Conservative republican stance that the federal government should not fund universal pre-K programs, and parents should be able to use vouchers to send their children to any public, private, or religious school of their choosing.

Aside from the typical party agenda items, Pence believes teachers and professionals should be able to receive federal funding to establish charter or magnet schools, the government should increase funding for the Pell Grant program, decrease the interest rates of Stafford Loans, and he supports federal tax incentives to help families save for college.

As was mentioned previously, Mr. Pence is in opposition to the Republican Party concerning the federal education standards and testing requirements for K-12 students (No Child Left Behind), and wants to eliminate the program entirely.

The following is a summary of bills that Mike Pence has voted on during his tenure as an Indiana state representative and as governor of Indiana. All of them are either directly and/or indirectly related to his support and/or opposition to education legislation. It is important to keep in mind that regardless of the outcome of a bill – weather or not it passed or failed, the way he voted (Yea-Nea) gives us insight into what we can expect if and when Mike Pence becomes President of the United States:
https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/34024/mike-pence/27/education#.WcQSXNQwhH0

Regarding Environmental Issues:

Mike Pence’s position on environmental issues has remained for the most part consistent throughout his political career. Until his recent support of Donald Trump’s “scorched earth” type attack on every environmental protection regulation and standard in existence, most if not all of the positions he held, and has supported over the years, have been in line with the pro industry, pro fossil fuel, anti regulation, republican platform. There are a great number of bills Mr. Pence has voted on, and a well documented accounting of the financial contributions he has received to support the following conclusions.
Given his new found contempt for all things designed to protect the environment, and given the opportunity to do so, Pence would likely seek to continue (or perhaps even expand upon) Donald Trump’s policies of dismantling the regulation and enforcement of the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act - and would support the increased development of traditional energy resources (e.g. coal, natural gas, oil) in areas that are currently restricted. Past opposition to related bills indicate he would seek to weaken or eliminate existing emission control regulation, and fuel efficiency standards on all gasoline and diesel-powered engines, including cars, trucks, and sport utility vehicles - and would oppose all international voluntary and mandatory emission targets to limit global warming.
Mr. Pence would also likely be inclined to discourage further development and use of alternative fuels, support the use of ethanol as an alternative fuel, support research and development of nuclear reactors as an alternative energy source, and would restrict existing energy producers to trade pollution credits under "cap and trade" laws.

The following is a summary of bills that Mike Pence has voted on during his tenure as an Indiana state representative. All of them are either directly and/or indirectly related to environmental issues. Given the large number of bills, it was relatively easy to support the conclusions above. Despite that fact, it is important to keep in mind that regardless of the outcome of a bill – weather or not it passed or failed, the way he voted (Yea-Nea) gives us insight into what we can expect if and when Mike Pence becomes President of the United States:
https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/34024/mike-pence/30/environment#.WcQSjtQwhH0

Regarding Budget and Finance:

Mike Pence’s positions on budget and finance issues have been consistent throughout his political career (for the most part). Making it relatively easy to determine where he will stand on the issues in the future. He has voted as a fiscal conservative, “religiously” (pun intended), and there is very little chance that is going to change. We can expect a President Pence to maintain his conservative, pro business, anti-regulation budgetary positions and attempt to:

Decrease federal spending on agriculture, arts, education, environment, international aid programs, national parks, scientific research, transportation and highway infrastructure, social welfare programs, and would likely continue the Trump “scorched earth” policies against FEMA, NASA, and the United Nations.

Increase federal spending on Homeland Security, defense, law enforcement on both state and federal levels, and contrary to the constitutional separation of church and state, attempt to use federal funds to promote “Christian” religious doctrine in public schools. (already underway in Kentucky, West Virginia, and Indiana)

The following is a summary of bills that Mike Pence has voted on during his tenure as an Indiana state representative. All of them are either directly and/or indirectly related to his positions on budget and finance issues. Mr. Pence’s budgetary positions will affect every American, and should receive the most scrutiny as such. I have listed a large number of the budget and finance bills he has previously voted on to provide as much support for my conclusions as possible (there are many more not listed). It is important to keep in mind that regardless of the outcome of a bill – weather or not it passed or failed, the way he voted (Yea-Nea) gives us insight into what we can expect if and when Mike Pence becomes President of the United States:
https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/34024/mike-pence/84/finance-and-banking#.WcQS3dQwhH0
https://votesmart.org/candidate/key-votes/34024/mike-pence/90/government-budget-and-spending#.WcQTOtQwhH0

In Conclusion

After spending many hours sifting through the available information (about three weeks into researching this), a not so obvious, but recognizable pattern appears – a pattern that prior to Mr. Pence assuming the Vice Presidency, would have been typical of any republican politician. Because of his lack of opposition to, and unwavering support for Donald Trump’s policies, making accurate predictions is increasingly difficult. Many of his views have become more extreme since becoming Trump’s vice president, but it is not too unrealistic to believe he would revert to positions more consistent with his past voting record if he were to become president.

I have tried not to let his possible involvement in the Michael Flynn scandal, his possible involvement in the Russian election scandal, his possible involvement in the James Comey firing scandal, and his many demonstrably false public statements relating to the before mentioned scandals, affect my objectivity – but facts are facts, and with each new revelation it becomes ever more apparent that Mr. Pence has some “splaining” to do.

Although each of these things individually should preclude him from ever becoming President of the United States, and he probably faces at least some legal consequences as a result of the various scandals. For the purpose of this article I will just assume none of them actually happened, and will continue to envision the possibility of Mike Pence assuming the role of President following Donald Trump’s eventual removal from office.

In the spirit of full disclosure (and this is probably quite obvious at this point), I am not now, nor have I ever been a supporter of Donald Trump or Mike Pence - and in fact, I had never even heard of Mike Pence prior to his being selected as Trumps running mate. My dislike of Trump goes as far back as the late 1990’s where I had direct contact with him and several members of his organization (crime family would also fit) – but that is a story all in itself…

Of all the issues outlined here, it is my strong belief that the abortion / women’s right to choose debate will be in the forefront of a Mike Pence presidency. I have tried to provide as much information as possible so you can either agree with my conclusions, or not. In the end, as I always say, “your just gonna have to make up your own dam mind”…

Regardless if you agree or disagree with me, I welcome your comments (supportive and adversarial) – if there’s one thing I love, it’s a good political debate.

Sources
https://www.congress.gov/member/mike-pence/
https://www.biography.com/people/mike-pence-071416
https://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2016/07/17/
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/16/us/politics/mike-pence-history.html?mcubz=0

BTW – If there is interest in this topic (enough readers), I have already done the research and will do a much more in depth accounting into Mike Pence’s stand on defense, taxes, employment and affirmative action, Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, crime and the death penalty, foreign affairs, and last but not least, science. Pence holds some interesting, and very strange viewpoints - every American should be aware of them...

Thanks for reading…
MDG…