When Pence finished praying by the Western Wall, he turned around and received an explanation about the place from Shmuel Rabinovitch, Rabbi of the Western Wall. When we stood upon them and the white covering above us was removed, our heads poked up through the metal frame that had held the covering, but our view of Pence was still obstructed by the men in front of us. It was only just a few minutes before Pence arrived with the full entourage of US journalists and photographers that we had been brought some shaky chairs. Together with Noga Tarnopolsky from the Los Angeles Times, AFP's Heidi Levine, Yediot Ahronot's Yael Friedson and several others, we spent an hour asking representatives of the US Embassy who had invited us to cover the event to change the arrangements so that we could sit in the first or second row alongside our male colleagues - but our requests were completely rejected. But now not one but two cues are coming at the number-one ball at the triangle’s tip with sufficient force to break up the current configuration.When we first arrived, we immediately protested. In the early going, the GOP candidates have resembled a tightly racked triangle of billiard balls. Another indictment, a dramatic debate, or a key primary loss and everything could change fast and dramatically. Trump could still end up as the GOP nominee, effectively forcing his party to embrace or finesse his now thoroughly refuted lie that the last election was stolen.īiden and his team would welcome that outcome, for this reason: Although voters very much want to move on from Trump and Biden, if offered a choice between the two, they seem prepared to grit their teeth and vote for the Democrat again.īut though pundits have a habit of mistaking the current moment for eternity, campaigns are not steady-state equations. Now, if Trump’s cultish and credulous MAGA base stays committed while other GOP hopefuls divide the non-Trump primary vote, the entry of two Trump-targeting candidates obviously could end up helping the man they hope to hobble. On Monday, Sununu said he wouldn’t run himself, but that as governor of the first GOP primary state, he would dedicate himself to stopping Trump, whom he views as a near-certain general election loser. He minced even fewer words about his former friend, calling him someone “who is obsessed with the mirror, who never admits a mistake, who never admits a fault, and who always finds someone else and something else to blame for whatever goes wrong, but finds every reason to take credit for anything that goes right.”Ĭhristie, who intends to focus on New Hampshire, will have an ally of sorts in Granite State Governor Chris Sununu. And if you want to win, you better go right through him because let me guarantee something from knowing him for 22 years: He’s going to try to go through Ron and Nikki and Tim and anyone else who stands in his way.” “There is one lane to the Republican nomination and he’s in front of it. “I am going to be very clear - I’m going out there to take out Donald Trump,” he said. True to his New Jersey roots, Christie was blunt about his approach. On Tuesday, erstwhile Trump ally and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie launched his own presidential candidacy as a Trump-seeking political missile. Pence isn’t the only one to offer a sharp and damning critique of Trump. (Remember when GOP hopefuls used to model the sunny optimism of a certain Ronald Wilson Reagan?)Īnd who knows, with the former president under indictment in Manhattan for business fraud and reportedly facing probable federal indictment related to mishandling confidential documents after his presidency, that craven calculation may not be such a bad bet.

As he has gone about his bullies-are-us campaign, the Florida governor has presented himself as a more competent and conservative version of Trump, the pugnacious cultural warrior. Take Ron DeSantis, Trump’s principal rival. Their collective message: Hello, fellow Republicans, if for any reason you decide you might like to move on, please note that I’m available. Until this week, most seemed content to wait for another candidate or another development to hobble Trump. For some months, it had looked as though the other Republican presidential candidates would ignore the rogue elephant in the room: Trump’s demonstrated disregard for both our Constitution and our democracy. So kudos to Pence for telling it like it was and is.

As Pence’s crisp formulation makes clear, after Trump’s scandalous efforts to overturn the presidential election, one can’t support him again for president and plausibly claim to also support the US Constitution or American democracy. At very least Republican primary voters will.

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