Politics

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Indiana Gov. Mike Pence may be the GOP s best chance at the White House in 2016, but for now, his priorities are closer to home. BY S.E. CUPP

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(AP/Michael Conro)

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Mike Pence leaves the stage with his wife Karen af er being sworn in as Indiana s 50th governor earlier this year. (AP /Michael Conroy)

Roads are big business in Indiana, and always have been. A decade after the founding of the capitol city of Indianapolis, the old east-west National Road, now U.S. Route 40, cut its way through the town, connecting Atlantic City, N.J., to the uncharted Wild West. Meridian Street, which runs north through the middle of the city, splits the state in two and originally ran all the way from Michigan to Alabama. The citys nickname is the Circle City for the giant circle where Meridian and Market Streets converge. Fittingly, the state motto is the Crossroads of America. Automobile companies like Duesenberg and Stutz once made Indianapolis a rival of Detroit, and now thousands of IndyCar fans gather at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway every year for the Indy 500 to celebrate and experience that rich history. Its this pride in a state which connected the coasts of a vast country that motivates Republican Gov. Mike Pence today. He grew up in rural Columbus, where his Irish-Catholic family set out to get a piece of the American dream. Roads weave their way through that story as well. His father owned a string of gas stations. His grandfather was a bus driver in Chicago. Pences road to politics, meanwhile, was neither straight nor smooth. He lost congressional elections in 1988 and 1990. But now, after serving 12 years in the U.S. House of Representatives and being elected the states 50th governor in 2012, the road many are talking about leads to the White House. Is Pence the GOPs best chance at derailing Hillary Clintons course in 2016? He might just be.

A PROMISING PICTURE
Pence is soft-spoken, deliberate and, some might even say, reserved. But he beams with pride as he shows me around his

ofce, an ornate, Italian Renaissance-inspired chamber lined with Indiana Oak. He chose the portraits hanging on the paneled walls himselfthree Indiana governors, William Henry Harrison, Jonathan Jennings and Oliver P. Morton; Herman Hudson, who founded the African-American studies department at Indiana University; and Madame C.J. Walker, the rst self-made woman millionaire in America. Theres also a painting that he was told was displayed at President Lincolns funeral. I love this kind of stuff, he tells me excitedly. Theres also a red telephone on his desk that his wife, Karen, gave him one Christmas. Only she has the number. And it occasionally rings, he says sheepishly. And every time it does, I stand. Theres a model IndyCar and family photos. And there are the requisite pictures of Pence with other presidentsboth Obama and George W. Bush. When we come to a photograph of the governor with Ronald Reagan, theres a pause. He tells me he was a 29-year-old candidate for Congress when he was invited to meet the president in the Blue Room.

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Then gubernatorial candidate Mike Pence speaks to supporters from the bed of his red pickup truck during a rally at a lumber yard in Lafayette, Ind., in 2012. (AP/Michael Conroy)

When I asked how nervous he was, he responded, Very, and then told me the story: He said to me, Mike, hows the campaign going? And I said, Well, its going ne. But Ive got something Id like to say to you. And he said, Well, go right ahead. And I said, Id just like to thank you for everything youve done for this country and everything youve done to inspire my generation of Americans to believe in this country again. And for the rest of my life I will always believe that, in that moment, the 40th president of the United States of America blushed, like hed never heard it before. If Pence admires Reagans humility, he equally admires his leadership, putting people before politics and even party

Pence actually grew up idolizing John F. Kennedy and serving as the Democratic youth party coordinator in Bartholomew County. (It hasnt hurt his career, he jokes.) But some things you just grow out of. He found conservatism eventually, saying, I started to think about the ideals that I cherished, and I was drawn to the Republican Party, predominately by the voice and example and the leadership of Ronald Reagan. He also found a new church, deciding to attend Evangelical churches with his family. He disregards the polls that suggest religion in America is on the decline: Faith continues to be enormously important here in Indiana and, I believe, around the country. People express it in different ways. But I still
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believe in my heart that an overwhelming majority of American people still cherish their faith in God and see it as important in their life as I do. As Pence went about forging his political career, he experimented with different forums, heading the Indiana Policy Review Foundation, a conservative think tank, and later starring in a local radio show, The Mike Pence Show, which he described as Rush Limbaugh on decaf. When he eventually won the 2nd Congressional District election in 2000 (and ve more times after that, during which the district morphed into the 6th Congressional) he took the kind of tough stances on scal and social issues that earned him Human Events Man of the Year moniker in 2005 for his principles of lower taxes, limited government, a strong defense and a erce dedication to moral authority. He voted to ban federal health coverage that included abortion funding in 2011 and sponsored a bill to prohibit federal funding of Planned Parenthood. He also took a controversial stand to cut spending in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. I asked him to reect on that time through the lens of recent disaster spending ghts in Congress over Hurricane Sandy. At the time of [Katrina], I was serving in a leadership role among House conservatives, Pence said. And every single one of us was supportive of relief effortsme includedbut we just thought that scal responsibility requires decisions about priorities. And I was pleased by the fact that, in the course of that debate, we passed what was the last signicant decit reduction act that was signed into law. We saved tens of billions of dollars as a way of offsetting the cost of those unexpected expenses. And I think thats what the American people expect from people in public life. They expect men and women who have responsibilities to be willing to make the choices and exercise priorities in a discerning way even while we meet the critical and vital and oftentimes the emergency needs that occur in our states and in our communities. I also asked him to reect on the recent shooting in Newtown, Conn., and what he thinks the gun control conversation is missing. I believe that rearms in the hands of law-abiding citizens makes communities more safe, not less safe, Pence said. But we recognize the fact that there have been tragedies in this country. One would be too many, but weve had many more than one. And theyve torn at the heart of the American people. The American people have big hearts, especially when it comes to our kids. But I think its possible to discharge our responsibilities to our families and our communities and also protect our rights at the same time. have suggested that one of the problems the GOP faced in 2012 was a lack of positive messaging and clear alternatives to the Democrats policies. For four years, Republicans ran an antiObama campaign instead of conditioning environments all over the country to embrace conservative ideas. Pence is reluctant to pile on in the autopsy efforts, but he does offer some analysis along those lines. Im someone who really believes that one of the reasons for our success in a difcult election year here in Indiana was we spent all the resources in our campaign articulating a positive vision for an even better Indiana. We talked about the progress Indiana made in the last eight years, becoming the scal envy of the country, advancing economic and educational reforms. But we spoke aspirationally. We said we want to go to the next level. We want Indiana to be known everywhere as the state that works, and we laid out a roadmap for how we would do that. We spent all of our time in our campaign not talking about what was wrong with our opponents ideas but what was right about our ideas. Conservatives in the wake of 2012 have also taken up the project of judging each other on their conservativeness, wondering aloud if someone like Chris Christie is too moderate and Ted Cruz is too extreme. I asked Pence if thats been a productive or valuable exercise for a party that is supposed to be a big tent. Well, Im a conservative, but Im not in a bad mood about it, Pence said. I understand politics is about addition and not subtraction. And I really do believe that any success that Ive enjoyed in public life and in being awarded the opportunity to serve in this position has been a testament hopefully to a lot of hard work on our part. But more importantly its been a testament to the power of the ideas that were advancing: the principles of economic freedom, of equality of opportunity in education, of common sense and common values and expressing those in a way that demonstrates respect for all concerned. And when it comes to the ways Republicans need to communicate their ideas, Pence naturally turns back to Reagan. I was drawn to the Republican Party because of the voice and ideals of Ronald Reagan, and what I heard in him was an uncanny ability to articulate the principles of limited government, a strong defense, a respect for American traditions and values. But what I also heard in Ronald Reagan was a gentleness and a respect for every American and a deep love for this country. And I truly believe that as I go forward in my career, Ill always seek to manifest those same aspirational qualities, because this is a very difcult time in the life of our country. People are really looking for answers more than arguments, and the more we can articulate the ideals and the policies that naturally proceed out of them, the more I think were going to be given opportunities at every level ahead.

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THE OPTIMISTIC COMMUNICATOR

In the wake of President Obamas re-election and the miniawakening Republicans have been experiencing since, many

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S.E. Cupp chats with Indiana Gov. Mike Pence on her visit to Indianapolis. (Photo courtesy of the Indiana governor s o

ce)

Opportunities like the White House? Pence tells me he hasnt spent a single second thinking about any other job. But others have been happy to. In 2010, Pence was the subject of a presidential draft movement, and, at the Values Voters Summit that year, he won the presidential straw poll. National Reviews Katrina Trinko and Erick Erickson of Red State were among the conservative voices pushing Pence to run, but in the end he declined so he could run for the governors ofce following Mitch Daniels retirement. Now, as the focus turns to Republican newsmakers like Rand Paul, Marco Rubio and Chris Christie, the attention on Pence may have waned, but it will no doubt resurrect as 2016 draws near. Until then, while some hope that hell make a run for the White House, he is focused squarely on Indiana and his mission to bring jobs back to the state. And, though the states unemployment rate is still above the national average, it dropped to 8.3 percent in May while the national average ticked up .1 percent. But in Indiana, all roads lead back to, well, more roads. In May of this year, Pence signed a $30 billion, two-year budget into law that invests more than $600 million in roads and infrastructure, all while passing on to Hoosiers a $600 million tax cut, a repeal of the state inheritance tax and business tax reductions. Its business-friendly overtures like tax breaks and deregulation that have lured companies like Geico, Toyota, Angies List and Subaru to invest and expand in Indiana. On day one of my administration, I signed an executive order that established a moratorium on any new regulation in the state of Indiana until we did a full-scale look back at all of

Indianas business regulations, he says. I simply think that less taxes and less regulation means more jobs. Indiana was also the rst state in the industrial Midwest to pass right-to-work legislation. Since we became a right-to-work state, Pence says, literally dozens of companies have initiated contact or made decisions to come to Indiana, and we welcome that. By Indiana becoming a right-to-work state, by our neighbors to the north becoming a right-to-work state, I think we are beginning to model the kind of policies and practices that can really relight the pilot light of the industrial Midwest, which I believe is of incalculable importance.

ROAD TO THE FUTURE

Ronald Reagan might have grown up in Illinois, but Hoosiers like Mike Pence are very proud of their next-door neighbor. And how do Hoosiers show their affection? Theyve named a road after him, of course. The Ronald Reagan Parkway has been a giant, 25-year undertaking and will one day link three interstates. Its not complete yet, but a little over a month after Pence won the governorship, a major section of that Parkway was completed and opened to trafc in ceremony, reported local NBC afliate WTHR.com. Meanwhile, whether Pences own road keeps him in Indiana for another term or brings him back to Washington is anyones guess. But plenty will be pulling for the latter.
S.E. Cupp is author of Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Medias Attack on Christianity. She has a weekly column in the New York Daily News and was recently announced as a host for CNNs Crossre.

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