Pence Strategy (The Pence Comeback)

== Pence's strategy turn against Donald Trump ==
In the middle of July Mike Pence's campaign was in a pile of trouble. It had still not met debate donor requirements and was lagging in polls. It also had low fundraising, especially for a former Vice President. Also, Pence's lane for winning the nomination was already occupied by several other GOP contenders - Tim Scott, Vivek Ramaswamy, Doug Burgum, and Ron DeSantis. Also, these contenders had better polling numbers and more money than Pence had. DeSantis also had major support from donors, Scott from the party establishment and some donors, and Ramaswamy from the Trump wing of the party (Ramaswamy was the top 2nd place presidential candidate among TPUSA attendees and he was occasionally being floated as a Trump VP candidate). Burgum was also very wealthy. 
In August 2023, Donald Trump was indicted for a third time. Unlike the other two indictments, Pence responded with a stern anti-Trump message. Thereafter, Pence qualified for the debate and received more money from anti-trumpers. 
The full anti-Trump lane was a much better lane for Pence. Pence's competitors in this lane were Will Hurd, Chris Christie, Asa Hutchinson, John Bolton, and Mike Rogers. Pence has a strong advantage over all of these candidates. Bolton and Rogers had not even decided, Will Hurd never held statewide office and was no longer an officeholder (and therefore had name recognition and fundraising problems), Hutchinson had extremely weak fundraising (and therefore did not qualify for RNC debates), and Christie's approval rating among Republican primary voters was upside down. 
Pence had also hired a new political director, a young man named John Stevenson. Stevenson was untested, and local media outlets believed that Stevenson's appointment was "a miracle", and "the biggest hiring upset of all time".
According to one of Pence's staffers:
"Soon after he came on, he asked for lots of privileges, including having deputies below him and near-unlimited access to members of Congress and other Republican presidential candidates. We had to really think about all of that and the acceptance was reluctant. Pence ended up deciding in Stevenson's favor in exchange for Stevenson telling Pence who he would contact."
After several days, Stevenson and other Pence staffers had a plan called the 2024 Covenant of Republican Candidates.