Official White House Photo by D. Myles Cullen Vice President Micheal Pence poses for his official portrait at The White House, in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, October 24, 2017.
Former Vice President Mike Pence has not received much financial backing from residents of his hometown since formally launching his bid for president early last month, campaign finance filings show.
Pence, 64, a Columbus native, had reported raising a total of $1,250 from Columbus residents as of the end of June, according to recently released filings from the Federal Election Commission.
The filings, which are current as of June 30, offer the first glimpse of Pence’s campaign coffers as he becomes the first vice president in modern history to take on his former running mate.
The 1977 graduate of Columbus North High School filed paperwork to run for president on June 5 and formally launched his campaign two days later at an event in Iowa.
Pence raised nearly $1.17 million during the 25 days he was officially in the race during the second quarter, including $346,740 in Indiana.
By comparison, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, former President Donald Trump, reported raising $35.2 million over those same 25 days, including about $80,200 in Indiana.
Trump has raised $671.50 in the Bartholomew County area since Pence filed to run for president and a total of $2,118 during the current election cycle.
Local GOP leaders said they weren’t entirely surprised by how much Pence raised locally.
“It does not surprise me because he has not asked for any money that I know of from Bartholomew County,” said Bartholomew County Republican Party Chair Luanne Welmer. “I believe that he probably will be doing that in the near future, or I hope he will, because I think he’ll get a plethora of support.”
Pence has struggled to find his footing since launching his campaign in early June, The Associated Press reported.
A lifelong conservative and staunch Trump loyalist while in office, Pence has been vilified by the GOP base for refusing to block the certification of Biden’s victory on Jan. 6, 2021, as Trump insisted, according to wire reports. The former vice president had no legal standing to block the election results despite Trump’s claims to the contrary, which sparked a violent uprising at the U.S. Capitol at which radicalized Trump supporters chanted for Pence to be hanged.
As of Thursday, polls showed Pence in a distant third place for the GOP nomination, with 6.7% of voters saying they would support him, according to data-driven news site FiveThirtyEight, which compiles averages from several different national polls.
Trump, for his part, continued to have a command lead in the polls, with 50.3% of voters saying they plan to back him, followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis at 20.1%.
The fundraising numbers carry additional significance because they are tied directly to the GOP’s first presidential debate next month, according to wire reports.
Beyond a 1% polling threshold, the Republican National Committee has announced that candidates must have a minimum of 40,000 unique donors with at least 200 unique donors per state or territory, in 20 states and territories.
Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and conservative businessman Vivek Ramaswamy announced in recent days they had reached the 40,000 donor threshold, according to wire reports. Pence has yet to make such an announcement.
He still may ultimately hit the 40,000-donor threshold to qualify for the opening debate, but the extraordinary possibility remains that the former vice president might find himself excluded from the Aug. 23 primetime event.
