By John Krull
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS – Mike Pence’s mind must be an interesting place to be these days.

Soon, his service—or subjugation, depending upon one’s point of view—as vice president of the United States to a president who often has treated him with little more than contempt will come to an end.

Pence’s relationship with Donald Trump has been fraught with tensions from the beginning. During the 2016 Indiana presidential primary, Pence offered his qualified endorsement first to Trump rival U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, before jumping onto the caboose of the Trump train as it accelerated from the station.

Trump responded to Pence’s ambivalence with his own. After publicly offering the vice-presidential nomination to the Hoosier, Trump then publicly reconsidered the offer and forced Pence to spend a humbling day, hat in hand, while the Donald deliberated on Pence’s virtues.

Since then, there have been many times Pence has been forced to bide his time, bite his lip and endure one indignity after another. He had to affirm his support for Trump when the Access Hollywood video surfaced. When the Stormy Daniels payoffs were confirmed. When one serious allegation of sexual misconduct after another against the president—including rape—came along.

All these incidents were contradictions of everything for which Mike Pence has stood.

Yet, he never wavered. He was always the loyal soldier, the unquestioning vice president of a mercurial president with all the personal discipline of a fruit fly.

How was Pence repaid for this loyalty?

Trump, his family members and his surrogates often speculated, semi-publicly, on whether Nikki Haley or some other conservative figure would serve as a better running mate when 2020 rolled around. Trump also mused on how much Pence “owed” him for saving the Hoosier’s political career.

It is true that Pence’s re-election bid as Indiana governor was in serious trouble when Trump named him to the ticket.

But it’s also true that Trump likely wouldn’t have won without Pence, who brought evangelical Christians and other social conservatives into the Trump tent. (The irony here is, of course, that those same evangelicals and social conservatives now are more devoted to the thrice-married, twice-divorced womanizer they were wary of in 2016 than the vice president who genuinely shares their values.)

In other words, Trump “owed” Pence, too.

But it was Pence’s misfortune to tie himself to a man who doesn’t believe in honoring his debts, whether financial or political. He’s also a man who likes to punish people who might have some claim on him.

The Trump-Pence relationship was not without historical precedent. Dwight Eisenhower and Lyndon Johnson, for example, also treated their vice presidents—Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey—with disdain.

But knowing that other presidents and vice presidents have had difficult relationships didn’t make it any prettier or easier to watch.

Or for Pence to endure.

Soon, the formal relationship between the two men will come to a close. Trump’s presidency will end.

Pence will find himself not on a public payroll for the first time in 20 years.

The conventional wisdom is that his political career is over. Others—including Trump’s children—have more legitimate claims to be heirs of the outgoing president’s political fortunes.

But it’s always a mistake to count out Mike Pence.

He has aspired to be president from the moment he was conceived. He’s also made a career of bouncing back from defeat and disgrace.

His first two congressional races were losers. In the second one, he became the focus of a national scandal when news broke he was using campaign funds to pay personal household expenses. And, as Trump never let him forget, his bid to hold onto the Indiana governorship was headed to defeat in 2016.

But Pence found ways to reposition himself.

After getting thumped in the congressional races, he went on a public apology tour and reintroduced himself as the prince of geniality. When his maladroit handling of gay-bashing measures such as the ill-named Religious Freedom Restoration Act poisoned his political prospects in Indiana, he established himself as Donald Trump’s conduit to religious conservatives.

Time and again, when people have written Mike Pence’s political obituary, he’s found a means of the resurrection.

The bet here is that at least one more time, he’ll find a way to climb out of a hole he dug for himself.

FOOTNOTE: ohn Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.