Republican vice presidential candidate Mike Pence was taken aback Friday morning when asked about a Thursday report detailing the Donald Trump campaign’s tactics to discourage Democratic voters from casting their ballot for Hillary Clinton.
On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Bloomberg’s John Heilemann noted that a Trump campaign official told Bloomberg Businessweek that the campaign has “three major voter suppression operations under way.” The adviser detailed how the campaign is trying to turn African-Americans, women, and other Democratic voters against Clinton.
“Is that okay, for your campaign to be involved in voter suppression?” Heilemann asked Pence.
“Number one, I haven’t read the article,” Pence replied. “That’s offensive to me, that kind of language. It’s not our operation. Donald Trump and I want every American who has the opportunity to vote to vote in this election. And that’s our message, is to tell the American people that this country really belongs to them.”
Heilemann tried to clarify Pence’s position on the campaign’s tactics, asking, “So your message to your campaign is if these things are going on within the campaign, they should be stopped?”
“Right,” Pence replied. “Like I said, I haven’t read the article. And I’ve never heard anybody in this campaign talk that way. Frankly, you know, it was offensive to me to hear that being reported in the news because that’s just not the approach Donald Trump has taken to this campaign. It’s not the approach we’re taking. We’re reaching out to every American.”
Watch the interview via MSNBC:
