Former Vice President Mike Pence on Thursday unveiled his “Freedom Agenda,” which outlined policy positions he argued Conservative candidates can back to win future elections.
He told Fox News Digital it was important for America’s right-wing party “to rally around a bold, optimistic agenda” to “stop the far left.”
“Elections are about the future and frankly the opposition wouldn’t love it anymore for Conservatives to talk about the past or the mess they’ve wreaked in the present, but I think it’s just as important that we get together.” Focusing on where Conservatives are at any level, whether that’s the active citizen or whether it’s people in public life, can carry the country,” Pence added.
Former Vice President Mike Pence on Thursday unveiled his “Freedom Agenda,” which outlined policy positions he argued Conservative candidates can back to win future elections
The three-part “Freedom Agenda” was published by Pence’s 501(c)(4), Advancing American Freedom.
Contributors to the agenda included a number of former Trump White House officials and conservative movement figures, including Kellyanne Conway, Betsy DeVos, Doug Ducey, Newt and Callista Gingrich, Larry Kudlow, Rick Santorum and Scott Walker, among others.
Pence has had to walk a fine line between promoting what he and former President Donald Trump (pictured) have achieved and not further highlighting his rift with the ex-President
DeVos resigned her position as former President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Education two days after the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Ducey, the current governor of Arizona, has become a Trump target for his refusal to embrace “the big lie.” Arizona was one of the red states where President Joe Biden turned blue in the 2020 election, allowing him to win the race.
Pence, who appears to have presidential ambitions in 2024, has had to walk a fine line between promoting what he and Trump have achieved and not pursuing his rift with the ex-president.
Trump turned Pence into a punching bag when, as vice president, he refused to overturn the results of the 2020 election while presiding over the Jan. 6 joint session of Congress to count the electoral college vote, which was disrupted for hours by the riots was interrupted.
With Trumpworld turning on him, Pence is trying to carve out areas of influence within the Republican Party.
The Freedom Agenda is divided into three sections: American Culture, American Opportunity, and American Freedom.
In a video detailing the agenda, Pence leads the culture section by talking about abortion.
“And to safeguard life, the sanctity of human life must be brought back to the center of American law,” the former vice president said.
The agenda calls for a ban on taxpayer money for abortion – already largely in place due to the Hyde Amendment – as well as a ban on US foreign aid that would go to abortion care.
It does not specifically call for the overthrow of Roe v. Wade, but the landmark case is already in jeopardy thanks to the conservative-leaning majority on the Supreme Court.
It also calls for an end to the “attack on faith-based adoption and foster care agencies that only place children in families with a male father and a female mother.”
Many conservatives want these church-based adoption and foster agencies to be able to discriminate against same-sex couples, although many places have non-discrimination requirements.
An entire section of the agenda is entitled: “Save and protect women’s sport”.
“Preserve and protect female athletic competition by ensuring that athletic competition occurs between those who share their God-given gender,” the document reads.
A hot topic that conservatives have taken up in recent months is whether trans women should be eligible to play women’s sports.
On voting, it said that voting in person should be the primary method of voting – and a voter ID should be required.
“Mail-in voting should be infrequent and only for a very limited number of circumstances, with clear policies and procedures for applying for, receiving, submitting, validating and verifying mail-in ballots,” the document said.
The agenda also states that early voting in person should be limited to no more than 10 days before an election.
Unsurprisingly, Pence’s agenda also includes the completion of the southern border wall.
Ideas to support American Opportunity include tax breaks and federal spending cuts.
Pence’s agenda could be used by Republican candidates in place of Senator Rick Scott’s agenda, who heads the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which has been criticized for Scott’s declaration that all Americans should pay some income tax “to have skin in their skin.” “. Game.’
Democrats have characterized this as a call for a massive tax hike, as about half the country doesn’t pay federal income taxes because it earns too little money.
The “Freedom Agenda” also proposes eliminating the entire Department of Education and turning its budget into “grant grants to state and local governments to provide maximum flexibility in the use of federal dollars.”
It prohibits the teaching of “anti-American racist ideologies such as Critical Race Theory.”
Under the banner of “American freedom,” the agenda calls for building a military power ready for “great power competition” against the Chinese Communist Party and Russia — with defenses ready to bolster NATO and defend Taiwan.
It also says that the “awakened” culture in the military should end.
In a section on China, the agenda said the US should “hold China accountable for its negligent release and concealment of the origins of COVID-19 and demand that they set up a Victim Compensation and Economic Recovery Fund.”
It also said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention should be held accountable for “poorly administered guidance on testing, surveillance, masks and social distancing”.
Under Trump, Pence was the leader of the White House coronavirus task force.
He was among officials who announced the original lockdowns: “15 days to slow the spread”.
And the Republican ticket likely lost the last election due to the government’s COVID response.
But with Biden’s inconsistent and unpopular approach to the pandemic, Republicans see an opening.
The introduction to the Freedom Agenda calls on Democrats to say, “You can’t go to work, you can’t go to school, and you can’t go to church,” a reference to the lockdowns.
“They have exploited a pandemic to increase their power over our lives and they aim to retain that power long after the pandemic is over,” it said.