Five times Pence broke with Trump

by TheHill.com - 07/14/16 1:49 PM ET

Donald Trump and Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, who reports say will be named Trump’s running mate on Friday, haven’t always seen eye-to-eye on policy.

Pence endorsed Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) in Indiana’s primary, and he criticized Trump’s proposal for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the U.S.

“Calls to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. are offensive and unconstitutional,” Pence tweeted the day that Trump made the announcement.

Pence is apparently standing by his opposition to the ban, though he hasn’t let that get in the way of giving his full-throated support of Trump.

“Look, I served in Congress for 12 years, I’ve been governor for three and a half years,” he said to reporters this week, according to ABC.

“I haven’t agreed with every one of my Republican colleagues or Democratic colleagues on every issue. But I’m supporting Donald Trump because we need change in this country,” he said. “I believe he represents the kind of strong leadership at home and abroad that will, to borrow a phrase, make America great again.”

Pence is also a supporter of free trade and has backed the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal supported by President Obama and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.).

“Trade means jobs, but trade also means security. The time has come for all of us to urge the swift adoption of the Trans Pacific Partnership,” he wrote on Twitter.

Trump has been one of the most outspoken critics of international trade deals throughout the campaign and has called the TPP a “rape of our country.”

Pence’s support for Cruz was notable, though in his endorsement he also offered praise for Trump, saying he had given “voice to the frustration of millions of working Americans with a lack of progress in Washington, D.C.”

Trump responded by saying it sounded like Pence was only ostensibly supporting Cruz to appease “special interests.”

“If you really take a look at Mike Pence, I think he gave me more of an endorsement than Ted Cruz,” Trump said in a Fox News interview at the time. “His donors and special interests obviously made him give an endorsement.”

Pence endorsed Trump exactly a week later, following Cruz’s exit from the race in the wake of his Hoosier State loss.

The two also differed on the 2008 Wall Street bailout, or Troubled Asset Relief Program. Trump offered tepid support of it at the time, saying he didn’t know if it would be sufficient to alleviate the recession but that it was “worth a shot.”

“I’m not sure that it’s going to work. You know, it is trial and error. This is very complicated. This is more complicated than sending rockets to the moon,” he said in an interview with CNN at the time, according to Politifact.

“Nobody really knows what impact it’s going to have. Maybe it works, and maybe it doesn’t. But certainly it is worth a shot. I don’t love the idea that the government’s buying back all the bad loans. How about some of the good loans? You know? I don’t like the idea that the government, frankly, is going to be negotiating with people to sell those loans, because maybe we’d be better off having the best bankers in the world do that.”

Pence, meanwhile, was one of the most outspoken critic of TARP among House Republicans, questioning the urgency of the need to address the financial crisis.

“I must tell you, there are those in the public debate who have said that we must act now. The last time I heard that, I was on a used-car lot,” Pence said at the time, according to CNN.

“The truth is, every time somebody tells you that you’ve got to do the deal right now, it usually means they’re going to get the better part of the deal,” said Pence, who voted against the TARP.

Pence also voted to invade Iraq in 2003 when he was a member of the House, while Trump claims that he was against the war from the very beginning, though some interviews he gave at the time seem to contradict that.

Trump has repeatedly slammed likely Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton for backing the invasion.

This story was updated at 3:01 p.m.