DES MOINES: Mike Pence is staking his presidential hopes on Iowa as he launches a campaign for the Republican nomination for President in Des Moines on Wednesday that will make him the first Vice-President in modern history to take on his former running mate.
Pence’s campaign will test the party’s appetite for a socially conservative, mild-mannered and deeply religious candidate who has denounced the populist tide that has swept through his party under former President Donald Trump. And it will show whether Pence still has a political future after January 6, 2021, with a large portion of GOP voters still believing Trump’s lies that the 2020 election was stolen and that Pence had the power to reject the results. Pence and his advisers see Iowa as key to his potential pathway to the nomination.