Republican vice presidential nominee Gov. Mike Pence tells voters in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania that a Trump-Pence administration would reverse the “weak and feckless” foreign policy of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
He also included details of the now Democratic presidential nominee’s failed “reset” with Russia.
After recognizing the men and women who have served in the U.S. military, Pence spoke of visiting the fields in Gettysburg with his daughter and laying a wreath where “the 27th of Indiana lost 40 percent of their soldiers in one charge up a small hill.”
“What we have inherited, is freedom,” said Pence who spoke of the “price of freedom.”
Pence, running mate to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, called Clinton the “architect of America’s foreign policy” as he said that the leadership of Clinton and President Barack Obama has, “weakened America’s place in the world.”
“History teaches that weakness arouses evil,” said Pence. “That the weak and feckless foreign policy of [former Secretary of State] Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama has created an environment on the world stage, of an America leading from behind, of moving red lines in Syria.”
In August 2012 Obama set a red line for Syria. “We have been very clear to the Assad regime — but also to other players on the ground — that a red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized,” he said according to CNN. Assad crossed that line in 2012 and 2013 when Sarin gas was used to kill Syrians, including an August 2013 attack that killed 1,400 according to Bloomberg. Obama had promised airstrikes, but didn’t follow through.
Pence continued in his speech to the Pennsylvania crowd, “Hillary Clinton actually said that the number one priority during her tenure as Secretary of State was the reset with Russia.”
“She posed for a picture, she pressed the button and Russia invaded Ukraine,” said Pence. “And Russia has inserted itself along the brutal regime in Syria. As we stand here today threatens to bring its incredible violence against defenseless civilians in Aleppo.”
Pence talked about the Obama and Clinton decision to withdraw all combat forces from Operation Iraqi Freedom forces and the resulting “vacuum after 2012 in which the terrorist organization ISIS was able literally to be conjured up out of the desert sands and overrun vast areas of Iran.”
He criticized Clinton for her part in the nuclear deal with Iran, of which Pence said, “all we did was delay their nuclear ambitions.”
He spoke of Clinton’s State Department under which four Americans died during a terrorist attack on Americans in Benghazi, Libya. He criticized Clinton for telling the families of the fallen that a video was to blame, but emails sent before she spoke with the families revealed that she knew it was terrorist attack virtually from the beginning.
Pence promised a reform of the Veteran’s Administration under a Trump-Pence administration and that they will stand with both current and former members of the military.
During the question and answer portion of the town hall, U.S. military veteran Walter from Gettysburg asked:
One of the things that really frustrates me with the current administration is the lack of accountability by people who are either failing or doing wrong. We have a VA system that years ago they discovered was failing systems with corruption, with people dying on line and yet today we wake up to the news that it’s still going on in the first hot spot where it was found, not to mention all the other up and down the executive branch. Donald Trump’s administration, I want to hear that they’re going to hold people accountable for what they promised to do.
“Consider it heard,” answered Pence. “He is not a shy and retiring man. I’ll tell you what. To be around [Trump] is to be around an executive.”
After 12 years in congress and four years as governor in Indiana, Pence said he “knows the difference between doers and talkers. The man is a doer.” Pence described Trump as an encourager and “someone that is able to bring around him a team that drives toward excellence,” but that “he is impatient with failure and he will be impatient with failure in the national government, especially where it comes to our veterans.”
Audience member “Chuck” asked Pence that the campaign would speak more about the needs in the urban cities. “It seems like the other side have claimed absolute control of urban cities, it’s a lie. They don’t have it.”
“Couldn’t agree with you more and neither could Donald Trump,” replied Pence who thanked the man for his service to the country. Pence then recalled sitting with Trump in a Cleveland church. “We celebrate the incredible accomplishments of African Americans throughout the storied history of this nation, the contributions that they’ve made, including yours.
“The truth is our minority communities, particularly African American communities have been let down in our major cities too often by decades of failed Democratic leadership that has made empty promises and that’s gonna change,” said Pence.
“Donald Trump is a man who is impatient with failure,” Pence said again as he recalled Trump going to Detroit and summarized Trump’s words there,
In a Trump-Pence administration, we are not going to accept that the American Dream does not reach every corner and every street in every city, in every town in America. We’re gonna bring it alive and the way you do it is you get the economy moving again, you support law enforcement at every level so that we can bring law and order to our communities and lastly…Donald Trump and I believe that every parent in this country should be able to choose where their children go to school regardless of their income or area code. School choice will be at the center of a Trump-Pence administration’s education agenda.
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