Olivia Troye, a former national security adviser to former Vice President Mike Pence, on Sunday urged her former boss to support Vice President Harris’ presidential bid, saying it was “the right thing to do.”
Troye, who has emerged as a vocal Republican critic of the Trump administration since leaving the White House in 2020, told MSNBC host Alex Witt that it would be a “beautiful dream” if Pence endorsed Harris, who formally won the Democratic presidential nomination last week.
“So, if [Pence] “To everyone listening to this right now, please do the right thing,” Troy said Sunday.
“Once again, you’ve shown incredible courage. You know what the issues are better than anyone here, and your voice can make a big difference to conservatives across the country,” she said.
Troy is part of the Harris campaign’s new “Republicans for Harris” group, which is made up of more than 25 Republicans. At the group’s launch on Sunday, Troy said the stakes in this election are “too high to jeopardize our freedoms and our Constitution with partisanship.”
“At the end of the day, this is about democracy, about the ideals that the Republican Party has had about individual liberty and individual rights, and that’s what Kamala Harris is trying to do here – she’s trying to build a coalition to protect those rights,” Troy said.
Republicans in Harris’ campaign plan to work to galvanize Republican voices and “talk to friends and family about the importance of voting for the vice president,” with the campaign describing the group as a “campaign within a campaign.”
The group plans to hold kickoff events on Monday in the battleground states of Arizona, North Carolina and Pennsylvania.
Pence, who dropped out of the Republican presidential bid last year, said earlier this year that he would not support former President Trump’s reelection after relations between the two former leaders became strained after the 2020 election.
For nearly two years, Pence has publicly said that despite pressure from Trump, he does not have the power to reject the results of the 2020 election on January 6, 2021. At the start of his campaign, Pence argued that Trump’s actions on January 6 were disqualifying and that he was increasingly out of step with the Republican base.
Biden endorsed Harris, who quickly solidified support from fellow Democrats and major fundraising groups.
Pence said last month that Biden “made the right decision” for the country, but did not elaborate on his thoughts about Harris.
The Hill has reached out to Pence’s team for comment.
