Mike Pence Won’t Ask His Staff If They Wrote NYT Op-Ed Because He ‘Knows Their Character’ – By Harriet Sinclair (newsweek.com) / Sept 9 2018
Vice President Mike Pence has commented that he is so confident none of his staff were responsible for writing the anonymous op-ed in The New York Times that he doesn’t even need to ask them about it.
Speaking in an interview with CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday, the vice president knocked speculation that the article, entitled ‘I am part of the resistance inside the Trump administration’, came from someone in his office after a suggestion by former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman that someone close to Pence was responsible.
“Let me be very clear, I’m 100 percent confident that no one on the vice president’s staff was involved in this anonymous editorial,” Pence said on Sunday.
Vice President Mike Pence speaks at the National World War II museum in New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S. August 23, 2018. Pence said he wouldn’t ask his staff if they wrote the NYT op-ed.
“I know my people… They get up every day and are dedicated, just as much as I am, to advancing the president’s agenda and supporting everything the President Trump is doing for the people of this country,” he continued, explaining he did not need to ask staff about the rumors.
“Honestly, I don’t have to ask them because I know them. I know their character. I know their dedication and I am absolutely confident that no one on the vice president’s staff had anything to do with this. But that being said, you know, whoever this was they should do the honorable thing and resign,” he added.
Pence himself has seen his name suggested as a possible author of the article; a spokesperson denying on Thursday that the vice president had anything to do with the controversial piece.
“The Vice President puts his name on his Op-Eds. The @nytimes should be ashamed and so should the person who wrote the false, illogical, and gutless op-ed. Our office is above such amateur acts,” Pence’s deputy chief of staff and communications director Jarrod Agen tweeted.
Pence also suggested in an interview with Fox News Sunday that he would be willing to take a lie detector test to prove he had nothing to do with the editorial.
