Former Vice President Mike Pence is dropping his bid for the Republican presidential nomination and ending his campaign for the White House after struggling to raise money and gain traction at the polls.

“After much prayer and deliberation, I have decided to effectively suspend my campaign for president today,” Pence said

Saturday

during the Republican Jewish Coalition meeting in Las Vegas. We always knew this would be an uphill battle, but I have no regrets,” he said.

Pence becomes the first major candidate to leave a race dominated by his former boss turned rival, Donald Trump.

The decision, more than two months before the Iowa caucuses on which he had targeted his campaign, spares Pence the embarrassment of not qualifying for the third Republican primary debate on November 8 in Miami.

But the withdrawal is a huge blow to a politician who spent years serving as Trump’s most loyal lieutenant, only to be made a scapegoat during their final days in office when Trump became convinced that Pence was somehow had the power to overturn the results of the 2020 election. and keep both men in office, something a vice president could not do.

While Pence averted a constitutional crisis by rejecting the plan, he angered Trump, as well as the ire of many of Trump’s supporters who believed his lies and still see Pence as a traitor.