Mike Pence

 Michael Richard Pence (born June 7 1959) is an American politician who was the 48th vice-president of the United States from 2017 to 2021 under President Donald Trump. Pence is a member of the Republican Party and was previously the 50th governor of Indiana between 2013 and 2017. Pence was also a U.S. House of Representatives member from 2001 to 2013. Pence completed his studies at Hanover College and earned a law degree from the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law before beginning private practice. After losing two bids for the Congress seat in 1988 and 1990, he was an conservative radio and TV talk show host from 1994 until 1999. In 2000, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. He was a member of the 2nd District of Indiana (2001-2003) as well as the 6th District in Indiana (2003-2013). Between 2005 and 2007, he chaired and was the chairman of both the Republican Study Committee as well as the House Republican Conference, the third-highest rank in the House Republican leadership. Pence described himself as a "principled conservative" and supporter of the Tea Party movement, saying that he was "a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican in this order.Pence successfully sought the Republican nomination for the 2012 Indiana governorship election after the term-limits of Mitch Daniels retired. In the tightest race for governor in the last 50 years, he was defeated by John R. Gregg, former speaker of Indiana House. Pence was elected governor in January 2013. He enacted the largest tax cut in Indiana history and also pushed to increase funding to private schools. Pence approved a number of legislation to restrict abortions. One of these laws prohibited abortions when the reason was the gender, race, or disability. Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The bill was met with a fierce opposition from business leaders and moderate members of his party and LGBT supporters. Pence was forced to amend the RFRA to ban discrimination based upon sexual orientation, gender identity and other criteria. This led to him being removed from his gubernatorial reelection campaign. On 20 January 2017, he was elected vice president of the United States. In his role as vice president, Pence chaired the National Space Council since it was reinstated in June 2017. In February 2020, Pence was appointed chairman of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, which was established to address the COVID-19 epidemic in the United States Pence and Trump lost their bid for re-election during the presidential race in 2020 to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris however, the Trump campaign refused to concede, made false allegations of election fraud, and filed more than 86 lawsuits which were not successful in multiple states. Despite Trump's urging to overturn the results of the election and the assault at the U.S. Capitol during the recount of Electoral College votes, Pence, in his role as the President of the Senate, certified Biden-Harris as the winner of the election. Pence has distanced itself from Trump by supporting candidates in several Republican primary elections that are against Trump's candidate.